ARABIA  PICTURED /"'•CHILE 
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PRINCETON  •  NEW  JERSEY 


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PRESENTED BY 

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D.    L.    Pi] 
1515    ; 
BROOKLYN,  N.  Y. 


TOPSY-TURVY     LAND 


SFH  il  IMhi 


TOPSY-TURVY    LA 


ARABIA    PICTURED 
FOR   CHILDREN 


BY 

SAMUEL  M.'ZWEMER 

AND 

AMY  E.  ZWEMER 


Fleming  H.   Revell  Company 

NEW  YORK        CHICAGO        TORONTO 


Copyright,  1902  by 

Fleming  H.  Revell  Company 
(July) 


PRESS  OF 

BRAUNWORTH  &  CO. 

BOOKBINDERS  AND  PRINTERS 

BROOKLYN,  N.  Y. 


DEDICATED 

To  the  Boys  and  Girls  \^ 

Who  are  Helping  to  Turn  the  World 
Upside  Down 


PREFACE 

This  is  a  book  of  pictures  and  stories  for  big  children  and 
small  grown-up  folks;  for  all  who  love  Sinbad  the  sailor 
and  his  strange  country.  It  is  a  topsy-turvy  book;  there 
is  no  order  about  the  chapters;  and  you  can  begin  to  read 
it  anywhere.  It  is  intended  to  give  a  bird's-eye  view  to 
those  who  cannot  take  birds'  wings.  The  stories  are  not 
as  good  as  those  of  the  Arabian  Nights  but  the  morals  are 
better — and  so  are  the  pictures.  Moreover  the  stories  are 
true.  You  must  not  skip  any  of  the  chapters  or  the  pictures 
but  you  may  the  preface,  if  you  like. 

j  S.  M.  Z. 

Bahrein y  Arabia.  |  A.   E.   Z. 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

I.     WHY  IS  ARABIA  TOPSY-TURVY  LAND?  15 

II.     A  LESSON  IN  GEOGRAPHY 21 

III.     THE  SQUARE-HOUSE  WITH  THE  BLACK 

OVERCOAT 27 

IV.     SABBACH-KUM  BIL  KHEIR! '  31 

V.     AT  THE  CORNER  GROCERY 31 

VI.     BLIND  FATIMAH 43 

VII.     DATES  AND  SUGAR-CANE 47 

VIII.     THE    SHEPHERD    OF   THE   SEWING-MA- 
CHINE   54 

IX.     THE  CHILDREN  OF  THE  DESERT    ...  58 

X.     NOORAH'S  PRAYER 64 

XI.     PICTURES  WITH  WORDS  ONLY      ...  69 
XII.     THE    QUEER    PENNIES   OF   OMAN    AND 

HASSA      .     .     .     .     o 73 

XIII.  ARAB  BABIES  AND  THEIR  MOTHERS      .  79 

XIV.  BOAT-BUILDERS  AND  CARPENTERS        .  85 

11 


CONTENTS 

XV.     ARABIC    PROVERBS    AND    ARABIC   HU- 
MOUR         92 

XVI.     GOLD,   FRANKINCENSE  AND  MYRRH       .  97 

XVII.     SLAVES  AND  SLAVE  TRADERS        .     .     .  101 

XVIII.     ABOUT  SOME  LITTLE  MISSIONARIES  .     .  108 

XIX.     TURNING  THE  WORLD  UPSIDE  DOWN,  113 

XX.     TURNING  THE  WORLD  DOWNSIDE  UP,  118 


1-2 


LIST  OF  ILLUSTRATIONS 


PAGE 

ARAB  BOYS Facing  Title. 

MODES  OF  TRAVEL 16 

EUROPEAN  VISITORS  ON  DONKEYS 18 

MAP  OF  ARABIA 23 

READY  FOR  A  CAMEL  RIDE 24 

THE  SQUARE  HOUSE  WITH  THE  BLACK  OVER- 
COAT    .     . 29 

SABBACH-KUM  BIL  KHEIR! 33 

ARAB  GROCER 38 

ARAB  BOY  IN  A  CROCKERY  SHOP 41 

HOW  A  MOSLEM  BOY  PRAYS 45 

WOMEN  SELLING  SUGAR-CANE 48 

DATES  GROWING  ON  A  DATE  PALM    ....  50 

FIRE  WOOD  MARKET,   BUSRAH 52 

ARAB  RIDERS  WITH  LANCES 60 

PEARL  MERCHANTS 62 

ARABIAN  WATER-BOTTLE* 63 

DESIGNS  MADE  OUT  OF  ARABIC  WRITING    .     .  70 

*  From  the  Sunday  School  Times,  by  permission. 

13 


LIST    OF    ILLUSTRATIONS 

ARABIC  LETTER  FROM  A  POOR  CRIPPLE  ...  72 

OMAN  COIN 73 

HASSA  COINS 76 

DATE-STICK  CRADLE 80 

WOMEN  GRINDING  AT  THE  MILL 82 

BEDOUIN  WOMEN  EATING  THEIR  BREAKFAST  84 

CARGO  BOATS,  BAHREIN 86 

RIVER  BOAT  BUSRAH 87 

SAWING  A  BEAM 89 

AN  ARAB  CARPENTER'S  TOOLS 90 

PUZZLE  OF  THE  THIRTY  MEN    .......  96 

BRANCH  OF  THE  INCENSE  TREE 98 

SLAVE  GIRL  IN  ARABIA 102 

LIBERATED  SLAVES  AT  BAHREIN 104 

MISSION  HOUSE  AT  BUSRAH no 

THE  SULTAN'S  SOLDIERS 114 

MUSCAT  HARBOUR 122 

AN  OLD  FRIEND  IN  A  NEW  DRESS 124 


it 


WHY  IS  ARABIA  TOPSY-TURVY  LAND? 

On  this  big  round  earth  there  are  all  sorts  of  countries  and 
peoples.  Men  walk  on  it  on  every  side  just  like  flies  crawl- 
ing over  a  watermelon  and  they  do  not  fall  off  either.  On 
the  next  page  you  can  see  how  they  travel  all  around  the 
world;  some  in  steamships,  some  in  carriages  or  on  horses, 
some  in  jinrickshaws  and  some  in  the  railway  coaches.  In 
Topsy-turvy  Land  they  have  no  railroads  and  not  even 
waggon-roads  or  waggons.  A  horse  or  a  camel  or  a 
donkey  is  used  for  passengers  and  the  camel  caravan  is  a 
freight  train. 

Or  if  you  wish,  the  camel  is  a  topsy-turvy  ship  which 
sails  in  the  sand  instead  of  in  the  water.  It  is  called  the 
ship  of  the  desert.  The  masts  point  down  instead  of  up; 
there  are  four  masts  instead  of  three;  and  although  there 
are  ropes  the  desert-ship  has  no  sails  and  no  rudder— unless 
the  rudder  be  the  tail.  When  the  ship  lies  at  anchor  to  be 
loaded  it  feeds  on  grass  and  the  four  masts  are  all  snugly 
tucked  away  under  the  hull.  In  Arabia  you  generally  see 
these  ships  of  the  desert  in  a  long  line  like  a  naval  proces- 
sion, each  battleship  towing  its  mate  by  a  piece  of  rope 
fastened  from  halter  to  tail!  But  not  only  is  the  mode  of 
travel  strange  in  Topsy-turvy  Land,  even  the  time  of  the 
day  is  all  upside  down.  When  the  boys  and  girls  of  Amer- 
ica are  going  to  bed  the  boys  and  girls  of  Arabia  are  think- 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 

ing  of  getting  up.  As  early  as  four  o'clock  by  western  time 
the  muezzin  calls  out  loud  from  the  top  of  the  minaret  (for 
Moslem  churches  have  no  steeples  and  no  bells)  to  come 
and  pray.     Arabs  count  the  hours  from  sunrise.     It  is  noon 


MODES  OF  TRAVEL. 

at  six  o'clock  and  they  breakfast  at  one;  at  three  o'clock  in 
the  evening  all  good  boys  and  girls  are  asleep. 

In  Topsy-turvy  Land  all  the  habits  and  customs  are  ex- 
actly opposite  to  those  in  America  or  England.     For  instance 

16 


PICTURED    FOR    CHILDREN 

A  R  A  B  I  A 

when  a  boy  enters  a  room  he  takes  off  his  shoes  but  leaves 
his  hat  on  his  head.  I  do  not  know  whether  we  should  call 
it  a  hat,  however.  His  hat  has  no  rim  and  is  not  made  of 
felt  or  straw,  but  is  just  a  folded  handkerchief  of  a  large  size 
and  bright  colour  with  a  piece  of  cord  to  hold  it  wound  round 
his  head — a  sort  of  a  hat  in  two  pieces.  The  girls  go  without 
shoes  but  carefully  cover  their  pretty  (or  ugly)  faces  with  a 
black  veil. 

At  home  you  eat  with  a  spoon  or  use  a  knife  and  fork. 
Here  the  Arabs  eat  with  their  fingers;  nor  do  they  use  any 
plates  or  butter  dishes,  but  a  large  piece  of  flat  bread  serves 
as  a  plate  until  it  is  all  eaten.  So  you  see  in  Arabia  the  chil- 
dren not  only  eat  their  rice  and  meat  but  their  plates  also. 
You  read  a  book  from  left  to  right  but  in  Arabia  everybody 
begins  at  the  right-hand  cover  and  reads  backward.  Even 
the  lines  read  backward  and  in  Arabic  writing  there  are  no 
commas  or  capitals  and  the  vowels  are  written  not  next  to 
the  consonants  but  stuck  up  above  them.  Potato  in  Arabic 
would  be  written  with  English  letters  this  way:  x  T  P 
Can  you  read  it  ? 

In  your  country  a  carpenter  stands  at  his  bench  to  work, 
but  here  they  sit  on  the  ground.  With  you  he  uses  a  vise  to 
hold  the  board  or  stick  he  is  planing;  here  he  uses  his  bare 
toes.  With  you  he  pushes  the  saw  or,  especially,  the  plane 
away  from  him  to  cut  or  to  smooth  a  piece  of  wood,  but  in 
Topsy-turvy  Land  he  pulls  his  tools  towards  him.  Buttons 
are  on  the  button-hole  side  and  the  holes  are  where  you  put 
the  buttons.  Door  keys  and  door  hinges  are  made  of  wood, 
not  of  iron  as  in  the  Occident.     The  women  wear  toe-rings 

17 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 

and  nose-rings  as  well  as  earrings  and  bracelets.  Every- 
thing seems  different  from  what  it  is  in  a  Christian  country. 
One  strange  sight  is  to  meet  people  out  riding.  Do  you 
know  that  the  men  ride  donkeys  side-saddle,  but  the  women 
ride  as  men  do  in  your  country  ?  When  a  missionary  lady 
first  came  to  Bahrein  in  Eastern  Arabia  and  the  boys  saw 
her  riding  a  donkey  they  called  out:  "  Come  and  see,  come 
and  see!     The  lady  has  no  feet  /"    Because  they  saw  only 


EUROPEAN  VISITORS  ON  DONKEYS. 

one  side  of  her.  Then  another  one  called  out  and  said: 
"  Yes  she  has,  and  they  are  both  on  this  side  I  " 

Another  odd  custom  is  that  Arabs  always  turn  the  fingers 
of  the  hand  down  as  we  turn  them  up  in  beckoning  or  call- 
ing anybody.    Many  other  gestures  seem  topsy-turvy  as  well. 

In  your  country  boys  learn  the  lesson  of  politeness — ladies 

18 


PICTURED    FOR    CHILDREN 

ARABIA 

first;  but  it  is  not  so  over  here.     It  is  men  first  in  all  grades 
of  society;  and  not  only  men  first  but  men  last,  in  the  mid- 
dle, and  all  the  time.     Women  and  girls  have  a  very  small 
place   given  them  in  Topsy-turvy  Land.     The  Arabs  say 
that  of  all  animal  kinds  the  female  is  the  most  valuable  ex- 
cept in  the  case  of  mankind!     When  a  girl  baby  is  born  the 
parents    are    thought   very    unfortunate.     How    hard    the 
Bedouin  girls  have  to  work!     They  are  treated  just  like 
beasts  of  burden  as  if  they  had  no  souls.     They  go  barefoot 
carrying  heavy  loads  of  wood  or  skins  of  water,  grind  the 
meal  and   make   fresh   bread   every  morning  or  spin  the 
camel's  hair  or  goafs  hair  into  one  coarse  garment.     They 
are  very  ignorant  and  superstitious,  the  chief  remedies  for 
sickness  being  to  brand  the  body  with  a  hot  iron  or  wear 
charms— a  verse  from  the  Koran  sewn  up  in  leather  or  a 
string  of  blue  beads,  which  are  supposed  to  drive  away  evil 
influences. 

How  very  thankful  girls  should  be  that  in  all  Christian 
lands  they  have  a  higher  place  and  a  better  lot  than  the 
poor  girls  and  women  of  Arabia!  For  the  greatest  con- 
trast is  the  religion  of  the  inhabitants  of  Topsy-turvy 
Land.  That  is  all  upside  down  too.  The  Lord  Jesus 
teaches  us  to  pray  in  secret  not  to  be  seen  of  men;  we 
are  to  go  quietly  alone  and  tell  God  everything.  But 
Mohammed,  the  prophet  of  Arabia,  taught  his  followers  to 
pray  openly  on  any  street  corner,  or  on  the  deck  of  a  ship,  in 
public,  just  like  the  Pharisees  whom  Jesus  condemns.  And 
when  these  people  fast,  as  they  are  supposed  to  for  a  whole 
month,  they  do  not  really  go  without  food,  but  each  day  at 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 

sunset  they  begin  to  eat  in  larger  quantity  than  usual! — be- 
cause they  think  by  such  fasting  to  gain  favour  with  God 
and  do  not  know  that  to  fast  from  sin  and  evil  habits  is  the 
fast  God  wants.  Another  thing  very  sad  in  this  land  of 
Topsy-turvy  is  that  there  are  no  Sunday-schools — they 
do  not  observe  our  Sabbath — and  the  boys  and  girls  do  not 
have  bright  Sunday-school  lesson  leaves  or  a  picture-roll. 
They  spend  Sunday  and  every  other  day  in  learning  all  the 
evil  they  see  in  those  that  are  grown  up.  Poor  children! 
They  have  never  heard  the  sweet  words  of  Jesus,  "  Suffer 
little  children  to  come  unto  me  and  forbid  them  not :  for  of 
such  is  the  kingdom  of  God."  We  tell  you  all  this  about 
them  that  you  may  pray  for  them  that  God  may  soon  send 
more  missionaries  to  preach  to  them  these  precious  words. 
We  want  you  all  by  prayer  and  offerings  to  help  put  a 
silver  lining  in  the  dark  clouds  of  their  lives. 

The  other  chapters  in  this  little  book  will  tell  you  more 
about  the  land  and  its  people  and  as  you  read  them  do  not 
forget  to  pray  for  them. 

If  you  are  faithful  and  true,  always  shining  for  Jesus, 
your  bright  light  will  reach  as  far  as  dark  Arabia,  and  will 
help  to  turn  that  land  of  Topsy-turvy  right  side  up.  When 
joy  and  gladness  will  take  the  place  of  sorrow  and  sadness, 
and  ignorance  give  way  to  the  knowledge  of  the  Truth.  In 
one  place  in  the  Bible  it  tells  how  to  make  these  topsy- 
turvy lands  right  side  up  again.  Do  you  know  where  that 
is?  Acts  17:6,  7.  "These  that  have  turned  the  world 
upside   down    are  come   hither  also    .     .     .     saying  that 

there  is  another  King,  even  Jesus." 

20 


II 

A  LESSON  IN  GEOGRAPHY 

In  the  atlas  Arabia  looks  like  a  big  mail-pouch  hung  up 
by  the  side  of  some  railway  station,  pretty  empty  of 
everything.  But  this  queer  mail-pouch  country  is  not  as 
empty  as  people  imagine.  It  is  a  country  larger  than  all  of 
the  United  States  east  of  the  Mississippi.  It  is  longer  than 
the  longest  mail-pouch  and  much  wider.  From  north  to 
south  you  can  ride  a  camel  one  thousand  miles  and  from 
east  to  west  more  than  six  hundred.  But  the  geography  of 
the  country  is  topsy-turvy  altogether  and  that  is  why  it 
has  been  so  long  a  neglected  peninsula.  People  kept  on 
wondering  at  the  queer  exterior  of  the  mail-pouch  and 
never  opened  the  lock  to  its  secrets  by  looking  into  the 
interior. 

First  of  all,  Arabia  is  perhaps  the  only  land  that  has  three 
of  its  boundaries  fixed  and  the  other  always  shifting. 
Such  is  the  case  with  the  northern  boundary  of  Arabia. 
It  is  different  on  every  map  and  changes  every  year  because 
the  inhabitants  go  about  as  nomads;  that  is,  they  "have  no 
continuing  city." 

Arabia   has    no   rivers   except   underground.     It  has  no 

railroad   and  very  few  roads  at  all.     Some   parts  of  the 

country  are  very  green  and  fertile  and  in  other  parts  there 

is  not  enough  grass  the  year  around  to  give  one   square 

meal  to  a  single  grasshopper.     Arabia  has  four  thousand 

21 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 

miles  of  coast  and  yet  only  six  harbours  where  steamers 
call.  There  are  better  maps  of  the  North  Pole  and  of  Mars 
and  of  the  moon  than  of  southeastern  Arabia.  The  reason 
is  that  men  have  spent  millions  of  dollars  to  find  the  North 
Pole  and  telescopes  are  all  the  time  looking  at  the  moon; 
but  no  one  has  ever  spent  time  or  money  to  explore  this 
part  of  Arabia.  The  Greek  geographers  had  a  better 
knowledge  of  Arabia  than  we  have  to-day. 

There  are  no  lakes  in  Arabia,  but  there  is  a  large  sea  of  sand 
called  Al  Ahkaf,  in  which  the  traveller  Von  Wrede  threw 
a  lead  and  line  and  found  no  bottom!  No  one  has  been 
there  since  to  see  whether  his  story  was  true.  At  Bahrein, 
in  eastern  Arabia,  there  are  salt-water  wells  on  shore  and 
fresh-water  springs  in  the  midst  of  the  salt  sea  from 
which  water  is  brought  to  shore.  Arabia  has  no  postage- 
stamps  and  no  political  capital  and  no  telegraph  system. 
Different  coins  from  different  parts  of  the  world  are  used  in 
different  provinces.  It  is  a  land  of  contradictions  and  even 
the  waters  that  bound  it  are  misnamed.  The  Red  Sea  is 
blue;  the  Persian  Gulf  has  no  Persian  ships  and  should  be 
called  an  English  lake;  and  the  Straits  of  Hormuz  are 
crooked.  This  topsy-turvy  land  has  no  political  divisions. 
Some  say  it  has  five  and  some  seven  provinces;  no  one 
knows  what  is  its  population  as  no  census  was  ever  taken. 
In  nearly  all  countries  the  mountain  ranges  run  north  and 
south,  but  in  Arabia  they  run  nearly  east  and  west.  There 
are  desert  sands  six  hundred  feet  deep  and  mountain  peaks 
nine  thousand  feet  high.  On  the  coasts  it  is  fearfully  hot 
and  the  climate  is  often  deadly.     On  the  highlands  it  is  often 

22 


PICTURED    FOR    CHILDREN 

ARABIA 


MAP  OF  ARABIA. 


23 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 

bitterly  cold;  and  yet  the  people  are  al!  of  the  same  race 
I  and  speech  and  custom  and  language  and  religion. 

There  are  no  pumps  in  Arabia,  but  plenty  of  wells.     There 
are  no  woods  in  Arabia,  but  plenty  of  trees.     The  camel  is  a 


3r* 


?\* 


\SSJ* 


%    'A       . 


READY  FOR  A  CAMEL  RIDE. 

topsy-turvy  ship  and  the  ostrich  a  topsy-turvy  bird.  The 
Arabs  call  the  former  the  ship  of  the  desert;  and  the 
latter  they  say  is  half  camel  and  half  bird.  In  some  parts  of 
Arabia  horses  and  cows  are  fed  on  bojled  fish  because  that 
is  cheaper  than  grass !  In  other  parts  of  the  country  donkeys 
are  fed  on  dates.  Arabia  has  more  sultans  and  princes  than 
any  other  country  of  the  same  size  and  yet  it  is  a  land  with- 

24 


PICTURED    FOR    CHILDREN 

ARABIA 

out  a  settled  government.  The  people  never  meet  one 
another  without  saying  ''Peace  to  you";  yet  there  has 
never  been  any  peace  over  the  whole  land  since  Christ's 
birth  or  even  since  the  days  of  Ishmael. 

Every  one  carries  a  weapon  and  yet  there  are  very  few 
wild  animals.  It  is  more  dangerous  to  meet  a  Bedouin 
than  a  lion  when  you  are  a  stranger  on  the  road.  The 
Arabs  are  a  nation  of  robbers.  Now  you  will  wonder  how 
we  can  also  say  that  Orientals  are  the  most  hospitable  of 
any  people  in  the  world  for  the  Arabs  are  Orientals.  And 
yet  it  is  strictly  true  that  these  robbers  are  more  hospitable, 
in  a  way,  than  you  people  of  Western  countries.  They 
have  a  proverb  which  says  that  "Every  stranger  is  an 
invited  guest"  ;  and  another  which  says,  "The  guest  while 
in  the  house  is  its  lord."  If  an  Arab  gets  after  you  to  rob 
or  kill  you,  it  is  only  necessary  to  take  refuge  in  his  tent  for 
safety.  He  is  bound  then,  by  the  rules  of  Oriental  hospital- 
ity, to  treat  you  as  his  guest.  But  you  must  not  stay  there 
too  long  and  you  must  be  careful  how  you  get  away!  You 
will  find  instances  of  this  respect  for  the  duty  of  hospitality 
all  through  the  Bible  story.  It  was  in  the  earliest  Bible 
times,  as  later  and  as  now,  a  grievous  sin  to  be  inhospitable. 
The  cradle  of  the  Mohammedan  religion  is  Arabia,  and  yet 
in  no  country  are  they  more  ignorant  of  their  religion. 
How  sad  to  think  that  when  they  do  worship  God  they  do 
it  in  such  an  ignorant  and  idolatrous  way!  In  our  next 
chapter  we  shall  see  more  about  this. 

Arabia  has  no  national  flag,  no  national  hymn  and  no 
national  feeling.     Every  one  lives  for  himself  and  no  one 

25 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 

cares  for  his  neighbour.  This  does  not  sound  strange  of 
robbers  but  it  does  of  people  who  are  so  hospitable.  This 
queer  country  we  are  about  to  visit  together  and  talk  over 
with  each  other. 

You  will  not  grow  weary  by  the  way,  we  hope.  If  the 
desert  tracks  are  long  and  tiresome  through  the  following 
chapters,  just  refresh  yourself  in  the  oasis  of  a  picture. 


26 


Ill 

THE  SQUARE-HOUSE  WITH  THE  BLACK  OVERCOAT 

You  think  I  am  making  fun  but  it  is  really  true  that  in 
western  Arabia  there  is  a  house  that  always  wears  an  over- 
coat. This  is  a  large,  square  stone  house  without  windows 
and  with  only  one  door  to  let  in  the  light  and  the  air;  it  is 
empty  inside,  although  crowds  gather  around  it  as  you  see 
in  the  picture.  Yet  this  house  always  has  on  an  overcoat 
of  black  silk,  very  heavy  and  richly  embroidered.  Every 
year  the  old  coat  is  taken  off  and  a  new  one  put  on.  A 
few  days  ago  a  Moslem  pilgrim  showed  me  a  piece  of  the 
cloth  of  last  year's  overcoat  and  he  was  very  proud  of  it. 
It  was  indeed  a  fine  piece  of  heavy  silk  and  the  names  of 
God  and  Mohammed  were  prettily  woven  into  the  cloth. 
This  man  had  just  come  from  visiting  the  square-house  and 
I  will  tell  you  what  he  saw. 

The  place  he  visited  with  hundreds  and  thousands  of 
other  pilgrims  is  called  Mecca  and  the  square-house  is  the 
Beit  Allah  or  house  of  God  to  all  Mohammedans.  It  is  also 
called  the  Kaaba,  which  is  the  Arabic  word  for  a  cube. 

The  Moslems  believe  all  sorts  of  foolish  things  about  the 
Kaaba.  They  say  Adam  built  it  as  soon  as  he  fell  down  on 
the  earth  out  of  Paradise,  and  that  Abraham  repaired  it 
after  it  had  been  ruined  by  the  flood  in  the  days  of  Noah. 
They  even  show  a  large  white  stone  on  which  Abraham 
and  Ishmael  stood  when  they  plastered  the  walls;  the  stone 

27 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 

still  bears  the  impress  of  Abraham's  feet,  they  say.  Did 
you  ever  hear  such  a  topsy-turvy  story  ? 

The  building  is  about  twenty-four  cubits  long  and  wide 
and  nearly  twenty  cubits  high.  It  has  no  ornaments  or 
beauty  except  one  rain-spout  to  carry  the  water  off  the  flat 
roof;  you  can  see  it  on  the  right  side  of  the  Kaaba  on  the 
picture.  This  spout  is  said  to  be  of  pure  gold.  In  one 
corner  of  the  building  is  a  large  black  stone  which  is  also 
an  object  of  worship.  The  Mohammedans  say  it  came  down 
from  heaven  with  Adam  and  was  once  pure  white.  By  the 
many  kisses  of  sinful  worshippers  it  has  turned  black.  Not 
only  is  it  black  but  broken.  For  about  three  hundred  years 
after  Mohammed's  death  the  stone  remained  imbedded  in 
the  walls  of  the  Kaaba,  but  then  some  wild  Arabs  from  the 
Persian  Gulf  came,  sacked  Mecca  and  stole  the  black  stone. 
It  was  carried  to  Katif,  a  place  near  Bahrein,  right  across 
Arabia,  and  they  kept  it  a  long  time  until  the  people  of 
Mecca  paid  a  large  sum  of  money  and  carried  it  back.  On 
the  long  journey  it  must  have  fallen  from  the  camel  because, 
at  present,  it  is  cracked  and  the  broken  pieces  are  held 
together  by  a  silver  band.  There  once  were  a  great  many 
of  these  stone  idols  in  the  Kaaba,  but  Mohammed  de- 
stroyed them  all  except  this  one  when  he  became  master 
of  Mecca. 

At  present  the  stone  house  is  empty  of  idols  and  yet  all 
the  Moslems  turn  in  the  direction  of  this  old  heathen  temple 
to  pray.  The  cloth  that  covers  it  comes  every  year  as  a 
present  from  the  Khedive  of  Egypt,  who  is  a  Mohammedan. 
It  is  very  costly  and  is  sent  on  a  special  camel,  beautifully 

28 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 

decked  with  trappings  of  gilt,  and  a  large  throng  of  pil- 
grims go  along  to  escort  the  overcoat. 

When  the  wind  stirs  the  heavy  folds  of  cloth,  the  pious 
boys  and  girls  of  Mecca  say  it  is  the  angels  that  watch 
around  the  Kaaba,  whose  wings  lift  the  covering.  It  must 
be  a  wonderful  sight  to  see  thousands  of  Moslem  pilgrims 
stand  around  this  place  and  kneel  and  pray. 

Besides  running  around  the  Kaaba,  kissing  the  black 
stone  and  drinking  water  from  a  holy  well  called  ^em^em, 
they  have  one  day  on  which  they  sacrifice  sheep  or  other 
animals.  One  curious  custom  on  this  day  of  sacrifice  I  must 
tell  you  of.  It  is  called  "stoning  the  great  devil."  Early 
in  the  morning  thousands  of  pilgrims  go  to  a  place  in  the 
valley  of  Mina  where  there  are  three  white  pillars  made  of 
masonry;  the  first  and  largest  is  called  the  Great  Devil. 
The  pilgrims  cast  stones  at  this  pillar.  Each  one  must 
stand  at  the  distance  of  not  less  than  fifteen  feet  and  say, 
as  he  throws  seven  pebbles:  "In  the  name  of  God  the 
Almighty  I  do  this,  and  in  hatred  of  the  devil  and  his 
shame."  The  Moslems  fail  to  realise  that  Satan  is  in  the 
hearts  of  men  and  not  behind  a  pillar,  nor  that  he  can  be 
driven  away  with  prayer  better  than  by  pebbles. 

For  thirteen  hundred  years  Moslems  have  come  every 
year  to  Mecca,  and  gone  away,  with  no  one  ever  to  tell 
them  of  the  Son  of  God,  the  Saviour  of  the  World.  Thir- 
teen hundred  years!  Don't  you  think  it  is  time  to  go  and 
tell  them  ?  And  will  you  not  pray  that  even  this  place  may 
open  its  doors  to  Jesus  Christ,  and  crown  Him  Lord  of  all? 


30 


IV 

SABBACH-KUM  BIL  KHEIR! 

That  is  to  say,  "  Good-morning!  "  And  the  Arabs  in  the 
picture  do  not  add,  "have  you  used  Pears'  Soap?"  but, 
"have  you  had  your  cup  of  Mocha  coffee?"  Soap  is  a 
luxury  in  most  parts  of  Arabia  and  the  vast  majority  of  its 
inhabitants  never  use  it;  millions  would  not  know  it  if  they 
saw  it.  Perhaps  the  old  Sheikh,  however,  used  a  bit  of 
soap  to  wash  his  hands  and  feet  early  before  sunrise  when 
he  went  to  the  mosque  to  pray.  Now  he  has  returned  and 
sits  in  the  coffee-shop  ready  to  take  a  sip  of  coffee  and 
"drink  tobacco"  from  the  long  pipe.  The  Arabs  always 
speak  of  drinking  tobacco  when  they  mean  to  smoke;  I 
suppose  one  reason  is  because  they  use  the  peculiar  water- 
pipes  with  the  long  stems  in  which  the  smoke  passes 
through  the  water  and  bubbles  out  to  the  mouth.  Have 
you  time  to  stop  and  study  the  picture  with  me  ? 

What  a  pretty  window  in  the  corner!  The  Arabs  call  a 
window  shibaak,  which  means  network,  because  their 
windows  are  very  much  like  a  fish-net.  Glass  is  seldom 
used  in  Arabia  except  by  Europeans  and  Arabs  who  have 
become  civilised;  and  so  the  carpenter  or  joiner  fits  little 
round  bars,  one  into  the  other,  like  marbles  or  beads  on  a 
string  and  the  result  is  often  very  beautiful.     Light  and  air 

31 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 

come  in  (not  to  speak  of  clouds  of  dust)  while  no  one 
can  look  through  from  the  outside;  and  you  know  how 
afraid  Arab  girls  and  women  are  to  show  their  faces  to 
strangers. 

Under  the  arch  is  the  open  fireplace  where  the  big  coffee- 
pots and  water-kettles  simmer  all  day  on  a  charcoal  fire. 
The  old  man  looks  quite  cheerful  seated  on  his  uncomfort- 
able stool  made  of  date-sticks.  You  will  read  later  about 
our  old  friend  the  date-palm  and  how  the  tree  is  used  for 
nearly  every  purpose.  I  wish  I  could  show  you  how  they 
take  the  thin  branches  and  punch  holes  in  them  and  then 
deftly,  before  you  can  count  ninety,  build  together  a  chair 
or  a  bedstead.  I  have  often  slept  soundly  and  safely  on 
bedsteads  made  of  these  thin  leaf-sticks  no  bigger  around 
than  a  child's  finger.  The  sticks  are  full  of  "spring"  so 
one  does  not  need  a  wire  mattress,  nor  have  I  ever  known 
one  of  them,  if  made  honestly,  to  become  a  folding  bed 
under  a  restless  sleeper  as  they  say  happens  sometimes  in 
New  York  hotels! 

Although  the  old  man  in  our  picture  is  waited  on  by  the 
younger  Arab  (who  is  perhaps  the  keeper  of  the  cafe),  yet 
I  know  he  is  not  rich.  Do  you  notice  his  toil-worn  hands 
and  the  patch  on  the  shoulder  of  his  long  overcoat  ?  I  fancy 
too  his  pretty  vest,  so  carefully  buttoned  by  more  than  a 
dozen  cloth  buttons,  is  a  little  torn  on  one  side;  nor  has  he 
a  fine  girdle  like  the  rich  shopkeepers. 

Extremes  meet  in  the  picture  and  three  countries  widely 
apart  on  the  map  are  brought  close  together.  Of  course, 
you  know  the  coffee  is  the  real  Yemen  article,  which  coming 

32 


SABBACH-KUM  BIL  KHEIR 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 

first  from  Mocha  on  the  Red  Sea,  is  still  called  by  that 
Arabian  name.  The  curious  pipe  with  its  round  bottom, 
carved  head-piece  and  long  stem,  is  used  everywhere  in 
Arabia  and  is  generally  called  "  nargeelie,"  which  is  the 
Indian  name  for  cocoanut.  The  bowl  of  the  pipe  is  in  fact 
an  empty  cocoanut  shell;  the  stem  once  grew  in  the  jungle 
and  perhaps  tigers  brushed  past  it;  now  it  is  pierced  to 
draw  smoke. 

The  curious  pipe  is  from  India,  the  tobacco  first  came 
from  America  but  the  coffee  is  Arabian.  Let  us  listen  to  the 
story  of  the  cup  of  coffee:  In  a  book  published  in  1566  by 
an  Arab  scholar  on  the  virtues  of  coffee  it  is  stated  that  a 
knowledge  of  coffee  was  first  brought  to  Arabia  from 
Abyssinia  about  the  year  1400  by  a  pious  man  whose  tomb 
is  still  venerated  in  Yemen.  The  knowledge  of  coffee 
'  spread  from  Yemen  in  south  Arabia  over  the  whole  world. 
In  1690  Van  Hoorne,  a  general  of  the  Dutch  East  India 
company,  received  a  few  coffee  seeds  from  the  Arabs  at 
Mocha  and  planted  them  in  Batavia  on  the  island  of  Java. 
In  this  way  Mocha  coffee  has  become  the  mother  of  Java 
and  of  all  other  kinds  of  coffee  sold  at  your  grocers'.  Noth- 
ing can  be  more  beautiful  than  the  green  hills  and  fertile 
gardens  in  the  Arabian  coffee  country.  The  coffee  berry 
grows  on  an  evergreen  tree  of  about  eighteen  feet  high;  its 
leaves  are  a  beautiful  dark,  shining  green  and  the  blossom  of 
the  tree  is  pure  white  with  a  most  delicate  and  fragrant  odour. 
Each  tree  bears  an  enormous  number  of  coffee-berries;  a 
single  tree  is  said  to  have  yielded  sixteen  pounds!  Arabia 
not  only  produces  the  finest  coffee  in  the  world,  but  I  think 

34 


PICTURED    FOR    CHILDREN 

ARABIA 

the  Arabs  know  how  to  prepare  a  good  cup  of  coffee  better 
than  other  peoples.  The  raw  bean  is  roasted  just  before  it 
is  used  and  so  keeps  all  its  strength;  it  is  pounded  fine, 
much  finer  than  you  can  grind  it,  in  a  mortar,  with  an  iron 
pestle;  lastly  two  smelling  herbs,  heyl  and  saffron  are  added 
when  it  is  boiled  just  enough  to  give  a  flavour.  Some  fibres 
of  palm  bark  are  stuck  into  the  spout  of  the  coffee-pot  to 
act  as  a  strainer  and  then  the  clear  brown  liquid  is  poured 
into  a  tiny  cup  and  handed  to  you  in  the  coffee-shop.  No 
wonder  the  Arab  dervishes  smack  their  lips  over  this,  their 
only  luxury. 

But  how  did  the  tobacco  get  into  our  picture  ?  You  can 
hunt  up  the  story  for  yourselves  in  your  school  histories. 
Had  not  Sir  Walter  Raleigh  in  1586  introduced  the  weed  to 
the  court  of  Queen  Elizabeth  from  Virginia,  our  picture  and 
social  life  in  Arabia  would  be  very  different.  The  custom 
of  puffing  tobacco  has  spread  like  a  prairie  fire  and  it  is  now 
so  common  in  the  East  that  very  few  realise  it  was  not 
always  found  there.  There  they  are  all  together,  an  Indian 
pipe,  Arabian  coffee  and  American  tobacco!  How  much 
faster  and  further  tobacco  has  travelled  than  the  Bible;  how 
many  people  had  begun  to  drink  Mocha  before  Arabia  had 
a  missionary! 

But,  of  course,  nothing  can  travel  for  nothing;  and  some- 
body must  pay  the  travelling  expenses.  America  pays 
many  millions  more  for  tobacco  in  a  year  than  it  pays 
for  missionaries.  It  is  not  surprising,  therefore,  that  all 
Arabians  smoke  and  only  a  very  few  have  ever  heard  of  the 
Son  of  God,  the  Saviour  of  the  world.     As  Jesus  Himself 

35 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 

said,  "the  children  of  this  world  are  wiser  in  their  genera- 
tion than  the  children  of  light."  When  people  learn  to  love 
missions  as  much  and  as  often  as  they  do  a  good  cigar  and 
a  cup  of  coffee  there  will  be  no  need  of  mite  boxes.  God 
hasten  the  day. 


36 


AT  THE  CORNER  GROCERY 

It  is  not  a  very  long  distance  from  the  Arab  coffee-shop 
where  we  left  our  friend  smoking,  to  the  grocer.  The 
streets  are  very  narrow  and  unless  we  are  very  careful  that 
camel  will  crowd  us  to  the  wall  or  those  water-skins  on  the 
white  donkey  wet  our  clothes — see  how  they  drip!  Well, 
one  turn  more  and  here  we  are.  The  grocer  in  the  picture 
on  the  next  page  is  leaning  on  his  elbow  waiting  for  a 
customer.  And  if  he  keeps  his  groceries  as  free  from 
flies  and  ants  as  he  does  his  spotless  white  turban  we  will 
buy  our  day's  supplies  here.  The  shops  in  Arabia  are 
not  very  large  and  they  have  no  place  for  customers 
except  outside.  Sometimes  there  is  a  sort  of  raised  seat 
or  bench  on  which  the  purchaser  sits  when  he  bargains 
for  something;  but  generally  you  have  to  stand  up  outside 
while  the  crowds  push  and  the  traffic  goes  on.  One 
curious  custom  is  that  all  the  shops  of  one  kind  cluster 
close  together  in  one  street  or  section  of  the  town.  You 
will  see  for  example  in  one  street  a  long  row  of  shops 
where  they  sell  drugs  and  perfumery;  in  another  place 
there  are  only  hardware  merchants;  again  a  whole  street  of 
nothing  but  grocers.  I  think  the  reason  is  that  Arabs  love 
to  bargain  and  to  beat  down  prices  and  so  it  is  easier  to 
have  all  the  merchants  of  one  kind  close  together.  At  any 
rate  this   arrangement   makes   it  quite  convenient  for  the 

37 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

A  R.  A  B  I  A 


ARAB   GROCER. 

38 


PICTURED    FOR    CHILDREN 

ARABIA 

purchaser.  Indeed  it  is  becoming  somewhat  customary 
to  group  the  shops  in  this  way  in  some  of  your  Western 
cities.     Occidental  civilisation  can  learn  some  things  from 

the  Orient! 

Our  shopkeeper  has  a  mixed  lot  of  groceries  in  his  shop; 
many  things  which  you  would  find  at  your  grocers'  he  has 
never  heard  of.  Everything  is  topsy-turvy.  Just  fancy 
how  strange  to  hang  up  the  sugar  in  a  row  of  cones  on 
strings  like  sausages!  Do  you  see  them  on  the  ceiling  of 
the  shop  in  our  picture  ?  That  is  the  way  white  sugar  comes 
wrapped  from  France  and  is  sold  in  Arabia.  A  sugar  barrel 
would  soon  be  full  of  ants  in  this  country;  but  when  it 
hangs  up  on  a  string  the  ants  have  a  hard  time  getting  it 
away.  Maybe  there  is  a  suggestion  here  for  your  homes  if 
you  are  troubled  with  ants. 

In  those  big  Arab  baskets  the  grocer  keeps  his  carrots  and 
other  vegetables;  carrots  are  white  in  Arabia  and  there  are 
curious  vegetables  of  which  you  have  never  heard. 

Do  you  see  the  bottles  and  tin  boxes  on  his  shelves? 
Those  are  for  spices;  pepper,  cinnamon,  nutmegs,  curry- 
powder  and  such  things  of  which  Arab  housewives  are  very 

fond. 

The  big  bowl  on  the  left  probably  has  olives  in  it  or  other 
kind  of  pickled  vegetables.  On  the  right  you  can  see  the 
big  pair  of  old  fashioned  scales  on  which  he  weighs  his 
wares.  I  hope  he  is  an  honest  man,  although  I  do  not  think 
he  looks  very  honest,  do  you  ?  The  scale  hangs  true  I  have 
no  doubt;  but  it  is  in  the  weights  that  deception  lurks.  In 
Arabia  we  can  every  day  see  illustrations  of  the  words  of 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 

Solomon  in  the  book  of  Proverbs  about  "  divers  weights" 
and  "false  balances."  The  most  of  the  shopkeepers  do 
not  have  proper  weights  of  iron  or  brass,  but  use  ordinary 
cobblestones  and  pebbles.  Only  a  few  days  ago  I  bought 
some  walnuts  and  the  grocer  weighed  them  so  many  stones' 
weight!  Do  you  know  what  a  "stone"  weight  is. 
Maybe  you  had  better  look  it  up  in  your  dictionary. 
That  covered  kettle  near  the  scale-pans  on  top  of  the 
little  box  contains  semn,  which  is  the  Arabic  name  for 
sheep's  fat.  You  would  hardly  believe  me  if  I  told  you 
what  a  lot  of  this  greasy  yellow  stuff  the  boys  and  girls  eat 
on  their  rice,  and  how  much  is  used  in  an  Arab  kitchen.  It 
is  sold  by  weight,  just  as  well  as  all  other  things,  even  milk 
in  Arabia.  If  we  wait  long  enough  you  will  see  Fatimah 
and  Mirjam  and  the  other  girls  come  with  empty  bowls  to 
buy  so  many  pennies'  worth  of  grease. 

Do  you  notice  that  the  shop  has  queer  little  doors  on  the 
lower  part  of  the  front  opening  ?  The  other  part  of  the  shop 
is  closed  by  a  flap-door  that  does  not  show  on  the  picture. 
This  is  hinged  from  the  top  and  is  used  when  the  shop  is 
open  as  a  sort  of  blind  to  keep  off  the  sun  or  the  rain. 

When  the  shopkeeper  leaves  his  shop  for  a  half  hour  or 
so  he  hangs  a  sort  of  fish-net  over  the  opening  of  his  shop 
and  never  needs  to  lock  it.  This  is  a  curious  custom,  and  I 
have  often  wondered  how  the  shops  were  safe  from  stealing 
boys  or  robbers  in  such  cases.  It  is  one  more  instance  of 
how  different  the  East  is  from  the  West. 

The  shopkeepers  generally  close  their  shops  at  sunset, 
and  only  in  a  very  few  places  are  there  people  who  buy  and 

40 


PICTURED    FOR    CHILDREN 

ARABIA 

sell  or  go  about  to  do  shopping  by  lamplight.  Our  grocer 
on  the  corner  has  provided  for  emergencies,  and  the  large 
Arabian  lantern  ought  to  light  up  all  his  little  shop. 

Across  the  street  is  the  place  where  they  sell  crockery. 
The  salesman  is  out, 
but  his  boy,  as  you 
see,  has  taken  the  op- 
portunity to  eat  some 
apples.  I  wonder 
whether  he  got  them 
at  the  grocer's? 

His  father  sells 
water-jugs  and  jars 
made  of  porous  earth. 
Oh  what  a  blessing 
those  jars  are  to  all 
the  people  of  this  hot 
and  dry  country.  We 
have  no  ice  in  Arabia 
and  so  no  refrigera- 
tors; the  wells  are 
never  very  deep  and 
the  water  comes  a 
long  distance.  So  if 
it   were    not   for  the 

crockery  man  and  his  water-jugs  we  could  never  drink  cold 
water.  But  just  pour  the  water  in  one  of  these  earthen  pots 
and  hang  it  in  the  wind  and  then  in  a  few  minutes  the 
water    gets    cold.       We    missionaries    always   have  such 

41 


ARAB  BOY  IN  A  CROCKERY  SHOP. 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

A  R  A  "      B  I  A 

water-jars  hanging  or  standing  in  our  windows  to  catch  the 
breeze.  Perhaps  this  kind  of  water-cooler  is  very  old,  and 
Solomon  himself  looked  at  one  when  he  wrote  the  words: 
"  As  cold  waters  to  a  thirsty  soul  so  is  good  news  from  a 
far  country." 


42 


VI 
BLIND  FATIMAH 

It  was  on  a  Sunday  afternoon  that  I  first  met  Blind 
Fatimah  and  greeted  her  with  Salaam  aleikum  and  she 
answered  aleikum  es  salaam!  ''Peace  be  to  you  and  on 
you  be  peace."  I  asked  if  she  could  read.  She  said  she 
could  "  read  by  heart,"  but  could  not  see  anything.  She  at 
that  time  could  repeat  twenty-six  chapters  of  the  Koran,  the 
sacred  book  of  the  Mohammedans.  Now  I  think  she  can 
repeat  it  nearly  all;  it  contains  one  hundred  and  fourteen 
chapters.  Some  are  very  short  and  others  are  very  long; 
some  parts  of  the  book  are  very  good,  but  most  of  it  is  a 
jumble  of  events  and  of  things  that  never  happened— all 
mixed  up  topsy-turvy. 

A  slave  woman  was  Fatimah's  teacher  and  now  she  is 
helper  in  the  school  of  this  teacher.  She  is  the  prompter, 
and  always  begins  each  sentence  of  the  recitation,  and  the 
other  children  follow  on.  ■  If  any  mistakes  are  made,  she 
will  instantly  correct  them. 

She  is  a  peculiar  looking  girl  and  she  is  not  pretty.  Her 
clothes  consist  of  cast  off  garments  given  her  by  others. 
Her  head  is  generally  covered  and  wrapped  up  in  a  black 
muslin  veil;  then  she  has  an  abba  or  Arabian  cloak  of 
very  green-black  cashmere;  then  under  that  a  many 
coloured  garment  called  a  thobe ;  it  is  square    in   pattern 

43 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 

with  armholes  and  sleeves  nearly  a  yard  wide.  The  ends 
of  these  wide  sleeves  are  deftly  taken  and  thrown  over  the 
head  to  form  a  sort  of  tight-fitting  cap.  Underneath  this 
garment  is  a  kind  of  dressing  gown  with  tight-fitting 
sleeves.  Such  is  Fatimah's  wardrobe.  She  wears  no  shoes, 
not  even  sandals.  Would  you  like  to  walk  in  the  hot  sand 
with  no  covering  for  your  feet  ? 

Sometimes  I  visit  the  school  where  Fatimah  teaches  the 
smaller  girls  A,  B,  C.  It  is  a  topsy-turvy  school  indeed. 
The  object  seems  to  be  to  make  as  much  noise  as  possible; 
the  pupils  sit  on  the  floor  with  a  small  stand  or  trestle  (like 
a  saw-buck!)  in  front  of  each  one  to  hold  their  Korans  out 
of  which  they  read.  The  first  pupil  begins  a  sentence  at  the 
top  of  his,  or  her,  voice  and  then  in  a  sort  of  refrain  it  is 
taken  up  by  all  the  others.  The  teacher  sits  outside  the 
school  very  often  sewing  or  preparing  a  meal  or  entertaining 
visitors;  for  the  schoolhouse  is  an  ordinary  mat  hut  dwell- 
ing. If  however  a  pupil  makes  a  mistake  in  reading  she 
hears  instantly  and  corrects  it. 

When  the  hours  of  prayer  come  around  (the  Moslems  you 
know  pray  five  times  a  day)  lessons  are  dropped.  One  day 
I  called  at  the  school  at  the  time  of  afternoon  prayer.  All 
the  children  had  run  down  to  the  sea,  to  wash  their  faces 
and  hands  and  feet,  so  as  to  be  quite  pure  outwardly,  when 
repeating  Mohammed's  prayers. 

In  the  accompanying  picture  of  a  Moslem  boy  praying 
you  will  see  what  those  forms  are  and  how  much  form 
there  is  to  go  through.  Blind  Fatimah  stood  with  her  hands 
clasped,  looking  upward  with  those  sightless  eyes,  her  lips 

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ARABIA 


HOW  A  MOSLEM  BOY  PRAYS. 
4o 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 

moving.  Then  she  fell  on  her  knees,  with  the  little,  thin 
hands  spread  out;  then  she  bowed  down  until  her  forehead 
touched  the  earth,  continuing  in  that  position  for  a  little 
time;  then  she  got  up,  and  with  another  upward  look  and 
motion  of  the  lips,  the  devotions  were  ended. 

I  prayed  there,  too,  that  her  eyes  might  be  opened  to  see 
Jesus  as  her  own  Saviour,  and  that  she  might  know  Him  as 
the  Son  of  God,  and  not  merely  as  one  of  the  many  prophets 
mentioned  in  the  Koran.  It  seemed  such  a  sad  sight  to  see 
this  blind  child,  doubly  blind  because  her  religion  is  false, 
and  she  is  resting  on  a  false  hope. 

She  always  listens  when  I  tell  her,  or  read  to  her  about 
God,  and  Jesus  Christ  the  Saviour.  And  if  you  would  help 
together  by  your  daily  prayers,  perhaps  soon  God  will  give 
the  answer.  Would  it  not  be  blessed  for  you  and  me  if 
some  day  blind  Fatimah  should  have  opened  eyes;  not  to 
see  the  date  groves,  and  the  sea,  and  the  beautiful  sunsets 
of  Bahrein,  but  far  more— to  see  Jesus'  face  and  to  follow 
Him  by  leading  others  to  Him  ? 

"  For  thousands  and  thousands  who  wander  and  fall, 

Never  heard  of  that  heavenly  home; 
I  should  like  them  to  know  there  is  room  for  them  all, 

And  that  Jesus  has  bid  them  to  come. 
I  long  for  the  joy  of  that  glorious  time, 

The  sweetest  and  brightest  and  best, 
When  the  dear  little  children  of  every  clime 

Shall  crowd  to  His  arms  and  be  blest." 


46 


VII 

DATES  AND  SUGAR-CANE 

This  is  the  sweetest  chapter  in  the  book.  The  pictures 
are  enough  to  make  one's  mouth  water  and  give  one  an  ap- 
petite for  Arabian  dates.  I  do  not  suppose  there  is  a  boy  or 
girl  in  England  or  America  that  has  not  eaten  the  fruit  of 
the  Arabian  palm  tree;  but  how  many  of  you  know  the 
taste  of  sugar-cane  ? 

In  many  parts  of  Arabia.,  especially  at  Busrah  and  along 
the  river  Tigris,  you  can  see  the  sugar-cane  sellers  sit  by  the 
wayside  and  dispose  of  this  Arabian  stick-candy  to  the  boys 
and  girls  in  exchange  for  coppers.  The  woman  in  the 
picture  has  chosen  the  shelter  of  a  date  tree  and  beside  the 
tall  bundles  of  cane  she  has  oranges  for  sale  as  well.  The 
sugar-cane  is  cut  into  pieces  and  sold  "by  the  knot";  that 
is,  by  the  length  of  the  stick  from  one  knot  to  the  next.  It 
is  not  expensive  and  I  have  seen  even  the  very  poorest  chil- 
dren suck  their  cane  on  the  way  home  as  happy  as  sugar 
can  make  them.  The  sugar-cane  is  a  kind  of  grass  but  it 
grows  to  twice  the  height  of  a  boy  and  is  over  two  inches 
in  circumference.  The  stems  are  smooth,  shining  and  hard 
on  the  outside,  but  inside  they  are  porous  and  the  pores  are 
full  of  sugar  sap.  The  sugar-cane  first  came  from  India, 
but  the  Arabs  spread  its  cultivation  as  far  as  Morocco  and 
Sicily;  so  that  it  is  no  wonder  that  the  word  "  sugar"  itself 
comes  from  the  Arabic.     Yet  it  shows  how  ignorant  the 

47 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 


mm 

mm 

m  Mm 


WOMAN  SELLING  SUGAR-CANE. 

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PICTURED    FOR    CHILDREN 

ARABIA 

Arabs  are  to-day  because,  although  they  have  sugar-cane, 
their  sugar  nearly  all  comes  from  Europe.  They  do  not 
know  how  to  manufacture  it  and  therefore  eat  the  sugar- 
cane raw. 

Sweeter  than  sugar-cane  and  much  more  plentiful  is  the 
date.  There  is  no  place  in  all  Arabia  where  you  do  not  see 
the  date  palm  growing,  and  seldom  can  you  eat  a  meal  in 
any  part  of  the  country  but  dates  are  part  of  the  bill-of-fare. 
In  fact  thousands  of  people  in  Arabia  have  nothing  but  dates 
to  eat  from  January  to  December!  So  plentiful  are  they 
that  even  donkeys  and  camels  are  fed  on  dates  in  some 
districts. 

Many  of  the  dates  you  buy  in  your  own  country  come 
from  Arabia.  On  the  best  kind  of  dates  which  come  in 
wooden  boxes  you  will  find  Muscat  or  Busrah  stamped  to 
show  from  what  place  they  were  shipped.  There  are  very 
many  kinds  of  dates  in  Arabia,  and  only  a  very  few  sorts  are 
sent  abroad.  Some  of  them  are  too  delicate  to  stand  the 
long  voyage  and  others  are  found  only  in  small  quantities. 
I  do  not  think  any  of  the  dates  that  reach  America  equal 
those  we  pick  from  the  palm  tree  ourselves  here  in  Arabia — 
no  more  than  dried  apple  rings  taste  as  good  as  ripe  juicy 
sweet  apples  from  the  orchard.  When  the  dates  ripen  in 
September  they  are  picked,  sorted,  and  then  packed  in  layers 
by  the  Arab  women  and  boys  who  get  paid  for  this  work. 
Large  steamships  are  loaded  down  with  these  boxes  and 
many  of  them  leave  Busrah  every  year  with  no  other  cargo 
than  dates. 

The  date  tree  is  very  beautiful.     I  think  it  is  the  most 

49 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

A  R  A  B  I  A 

beautiful  of  all  the  palms.  It  is  no  wonder  that  a  palm 
branch  is  the  symbol  of  victory  in  the  Bible  and  that  the 
psalmist  compares  the  life  of  a  righteous  man  to  a  palm 


DATES  GROWING  ON  A  DATE  PALM. 


tree!     How  straight  and  beautifully  proportioned  is  the  tall 
trunk  of  the  tree.     It  is  an  evergreen  and  is  always  flourish- 


iji 


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ing  winter  and  summer.  It  is  a  lovely  sight  to  see  the  huge 
clusters  of  ripening  fruit,  golden-yellow  or  reddish-brown, 
amid  the  bright  green  branches.  Along  the  rivers  in  the 
north  of  Arabia,  at  Hassa  and  in  Oman,  date  orchards 
stretch  for  miles  and  miles  as  far  as  you  can  see.  Some  of 
the  Arabs  have  such  large  date  gardens  that  they  do  not 
know  the  number  of  their  trees.  How  do  you  suppose 
they  climb  the  tree?  The  Arabs  have  no  ladders  and  in- 
deed it  would  be  hard  to  make  a  ladder  long  enough  to 
reach  to  the  top  of  a  tall  palm  tree.  So  they  use  a  rope  band 
which  goes  around  the  trunk  of  the  tree  and  around  their 
waist;  it  is  shoved  up  little  by  little  and  the  Arab  puts  his 
bare  feet  on  the  rough  bark  of  the  tree  and  so  climbs  up  as 
easily  as  a  monkey.  The  palm  tree  is  perhaps  the  most 
useful  tree  in  the  world.  Every  part  of  it  is  used  for  some- 
thing or  other,  and  I  do  not  see  how  Arabia  could  get  along 
without  palm  trees.  The  fruit  is  prepared  in  many  differ- 
ent ways  for  food.  The  date  stones  are  used  by  the  Arab 
children  in  playing  checkers  and  other  games  on  the  smooth 
sand.  They  are  also  ground  up  into  a  coarse  kind  of  meal 
and  this  is  good  cattle-food.  The  branches  of  the  date  tree 
are  long  and  strong  and  thin  just  like  a  piece  of  rattan. 
From  them  the  carpenters  make  beds,  tables,  chairs,  cradles, 
bird-cages,  reading-stands,  boats,  crates,  kites  and  a  dozen 
other  useful  things.  The  leaves  are  woven  into  baskets,  mats, 
fans  and  string.  From  the  bark  excellent  fibre  makes  rope  of 
all  sizes.  Not  a  bit  of  the  tree  is  wasted.  Even  the  blossoms 
are  used  to  make  a  kind  of  drink  and  the  old  musty  fruit  that 
cannot  be  eaten  is  made  into  date  syrup  or  date  vinegar. 

51 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 

In  one  of  the  pictures  you  see  the  fire  wood  market  at 
Busrah.  The  long  branches  you  see  are  sold  for  kindling 
wood  and  they  make  a  splendid  fire.  The  heavier  parts  of 
the  tree  are  also  used  for  fuel  and  the  donkeys  are  loaded 
with  these  date  knots  and  date  sticks  in  baskets.  It  is  a 
busy  scene  and,  what  with  braying  of  donkeys  and  shout- 
ing of  the  wood-merchants,  there  is  enough  noise  too. 

There  is  one  more  blessing  that  comes  from  the  palm 


FIRE  WOOD  MARKET,  BUSRAH. 


tree  and  which  we  have  forgotten.  That  is  shade.  Arabia 
is  a  hot  and  dry  country.  The  summer  sun  is  much  more 
piercing  than  in  America  and  the  summer  is  much  longer. 
When  you  travel  a  long  camel  journey  across  the  desert,  oh 
how  good  it  is  to  come  to  a  grove  of  palm  trees  and  rest! 
Such  a  place  is  called  an  oasis  and  underneath  the  palms 
there  are  always  springs  of  water.  I  can  well  understand 
how  happy  the  children  of  Israel  were  after  their  journey  in 
the  desert,  when   they  came  to  Elim  where  "there  were 


PICTURED    FOR    CHILDREN 

ARABIA 

twelve  wells  of  water  and  threescore  and  ten  palm  trees." 
In  summer  time  many  of  the  town  Arabs  leave  their  houses 
in  the  city  and  go  to  camp  out  in  the  date-gardens  to  enjoy 
the  cool  shades.  The  Arab  poets  have  written  many  poems 
in  praise  of  their  favourite  tree  and  fruit,  but  none  of  them 
are  so  funny  as  these  lines  which  Campbell  wrote  from 
Algiers  where  the  date  tree  also  flourishes  and  with  which 
we  will  end  this  chapter: 

"Though  my  letter  bears  date  as  you  view 
From  the  land  of  the  date-bearing  palm 
1  will  palm  no  more  puns  upon  you." 


53 


VIII 
THE  SHEPHERD  OF  THE  SEWING  MACHINE 

In  the  blue  waters  of  the  Persian  Gulf  there  lies  a  coral 
island  called  Bahrein.  At  a  few  hundred  yards  to  the 
northeast  of  it  is  a  still  smaller  island  shaped  like  a  pack- 
saddle,  where  palm  trees  and  white  coral  rock  houses  are 
reflected  in  the  salt  water  at  high  tide.  The  little  island 
town  is  called  Moharrek,  that  is,  the  ''Burning  Place," 
because  it  is  very  hot  there  in  summer.  After  sailing 
across  in  a  boat  one  day,  and  wending  our  way  through  a 
dirty  bazar  full  of  flies  and  Arabs,  we  were  directed  to  the 
house  of  the  man  called  "The  Shepherd  of  the  Sewing 
Machine."  His  real  name  is  Mohammed  bin  Sooltaan,  but 
nobody  knows  him  by  any  other  name  or  title  than  Rdee 
el  karhhan,  which  literally  means  shepherd  of  the  sewing 
machine.  Let  me  tell  you  his  story  and  how  he  got  that 
queer  name. 

Years  ago,  as  pilot  on  the  native  boats  that  sail  from 
Bahrein  to  Bombay,  Calcutta,  Zanzibar  and  Jiddah,  he  had 
experience  of  a  wider  world  than  the  little  island  where  he 
was  born.  But  the  life  was  a  hard  one  and  his  wages 
were  small.  Moreover,  the  coming  of  steamships  up  the 
Gulf  took  away  the  profit  of  the  sailing  craft,  and  so  Mo- 
hammed fared  from  bad  to  worse.  He  loved  an  Arab  lass 
with  plaited,  well-greased  locks  of  hair  and  a  pleasant  face, 

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but  her  father  asked  a  larger  dowry  than  he  could  ever 
pay. 

An  Arab  young  man  must  always  pay  a  good  price  to 
the  father  of  his  sweetheart  before  he  is  allowed  to  marry 
her.  But  this  Mohammed  was  too  poor  to  pay  the  price 
asked.  What  a  queer  topsy-turvy  custom  it  is  for  a  man 
to  buy  his  wife  just  as  he  buys  a  horse  or  a  camel!  The 
Arabs  often  ask  how  much  a  wife  costs  in  America  and 
wonder  that  we  are  not  allowed  by  the  Christian  laws  to 
send  away  our  wives  and  marry  others. 

Mohammed  could  not  stay  at  home  so  he  once  more 
went  in  a  ship  to  Jiddah,  the  port  to  Mecca,  where  pilgrims 
from  all  the  Moslem  world  exchange  thought  and  money 
for  bad  bread  and  fanaticism.  And  yet  even  here  the 
civilisation  of  the  West  tries  to  enter.  Wandering  through 
the  bazars  Mohammed  for  the  first  time  saw  a  sewing 
machine  in  the  hands  of  an  Indian  tailor.  A  marvel  to  the 
sailor  fisherman,  indeed!  Almost  as  great  a  miracle  to  him 
as  the  Koran.  The  more  he  looked  the  more  he  coveted, 
and  he  could  not  pass  the  place  without  reckoning  up  the 
possible  profits  of  such  an  investment  should  he  return  with 
it  to  his  native  island.  The  result  was  that  he  forswore  the 
sea  and  preferred  another  kind  of  wheel  to  that  of  the  pilot. 
With  many  mutual  wallahs  the  bargain  was  concluded  and 
the  machine  reached  Bahrein.  It  was  the  first  on  the 
islands,  and  all  the  sheikhs  came  to  see  its  marvellous  build 
and  wonderful  work.  Mohammed  has  a  Western  head  on 
Eastern  shoulders,  and  there  was  not  a  screw  or  tension 
from  treadle  to  shuttle,  which  he  did  not  learn  the  use  of. 

55 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 

It  is  unnecessary  to  state  at  the  cost  of  how  many  broken 
needles  he  became  proficient.  Amid  cries  of  ajeeb,  ajeeb, 
the  first  Arab  shirt  was  stitched  together,  and  even  the 
youngsters  on  the  street  imitated  the  whirrr-clic-whirrr  of 
the  machine.  As  for  Mohammed,  he  sewed  on,  and  while 
his  sandalled  feet  worked  the  treadle  his  mind  worked  out 
a  problem  something  like  this:  Three  long-shirts  a  day 
and  an  abba,  at  one  kran  per  shirt  and  two  for  the  abba, 
thirty-five  krans  per  week,  how  long  will  it  take  to  pay  the 
dowry  ?  An  abba  is  a  large  over-garment  worn  by  both 
men  and  women  in  Arabia.  It  is  like  a  cape  or  overcoat 
but  has  no  sleeves  nor  buttons.  The  Arabs  in  Bahrein  put 
a  great  deal  of  pretty  embroidery  work  on  these  garments 
and  some  of  them  are  worth  twenty  or  thirty  dollars.  But 
the  sewing  is  done  very  cheaply.  A  kran  is  a  Persian  coin 
worth  about  ten  cents;  can  you  figure  out  how  much  Mo- 
hammed earned  in  a  month  ? 

The  Shepherd  of  the  Machine  kept  working  away  and 
when  his  hopes  grew  strong  he  sang  at  his  work.  In  a  few 
months  he  paid  a  visit  to  the  Mullah  (the  Moslem  priest  or 
teacher),  and  that  same  night  the  Arab  fiddles  and  drums 
rang  out  merry  music  around  the  palm-leaf  hut  of  his  be- 
loved bride.  But  the  music  of  the  machine  sounded  still 
sweeter  next  morning.  Daily  bread,  with  rice,  fish  and 
dates,  and  on  rare  occasions  even  mutton,  all  came  out  of 
the  machine.  He  loved  the  very  iron  of  it  and,  as  he  told 
us,  read  a  prayer  over  it  every  morning:  Bismillahi  er  rah- 
man  er  raheem.  His  was  the  only  machine,  and  a  small 
monopoly  soon  makes  a  capitalist.     His  palm  branch  hut 

56 


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ARABIA 

was  exchanged  for  a  house  of  stone;  and  Allah  blessed  him 
greatly.  No  shepherd  was  ever  more  tender  to  his  little 
lambs  than  Mohammed  to  the  old  machine. 

When  we  entered  the  house  on  our  first  visit,  there  stood 
the  machine!  Not  much  the  worse  for  wear,  and  with 
"  Pfaff.  C.  Theodosius,  Constantinople,"  still  legible  on  the 
nickel-plate.  But  the  old  machine  had  found  a  rival.  By 
its  side  stood  another  make  of  machine  which  looked 
strangely  familiar  to  American  eyes.  It  was  while  compar- 
ing the  machines  and  drinking  Arab  coffee  that  we  learned 
from  Mohammed  why  he  prized  the  old  one  as  better. 
"Wallah,"  he  said,  "I  would  not  sell  it  for  many  times  its 
original  price.  There  is  blessing  in  it,  and  all  I  have  comes 
from  that  machine,  praise  be  to  Allah."  And  so  we  sipped 
his  cups  and  heard  his  story  and  ceased  to  wonder  why  he 
was  called  the  Shepherd  of  the  Sewing  machine.  The 
shepherd  has  a  brother  who  wants  to  learn  English  and 
goes  to  Bombay  every  year — but  that  is  another  story. 

There  are  many  other  sewing  machines  in  Bahrein  now, 
but  Mohammed's  was  the  first,  and  he  introduced  the  others. 
Do  you  not  think  that  he  should  be  called  the  Christopher 
Columbus  of  Bahrein  tailors? 


57 


IX 

THE  CHILDREN  OF  THE  DESERT 

About  one-third  of  Topsy-turvy  Land  is  desert  and  is  the 
home  of  those  Arabs  that  wander  about  from  place  to  place 
and  are  called  nomads  or  Bedouin.  The  word  Bedouin 
means  a  desert-dweller.  But  you  must  not  think  that  a 
desert  is  a  flat  country  covered  with  a  deep  layer  of  sand 
without  trees  or  shrubs.  Oh  no!  There  are  such  deserts 
in  Arabia  too,  but  the  greater  part  of  what  is  called  desert  is 
much  more  attractive  and  is  only  desert  because  it  has  no 
settled  population  and  no  villages.  The  soil  is  often  very 
good  and  in  springtime  after  the  rains  the  whole  of 
northern  Arabia  (where  most  of  the  nomads  pitch  their 
tents)  is  one  vast  prairie  of  wild  flowers  and  green  grass. 
The  Arabs  of  the  North  are  rich  in  flocks  and  herds.  I  am 
sure  you  can  still  find  some  who,  like  Job,  have  seven 
thousand  sheep  and  three  thousand  camels  and  a  very  great 
household.  They  all  live  in  tents  and  the  tents  of  Arabia 
are  not  white  and  round  like  circus  tents  but  jet  black  and 
square  or  oblong.  You  remember  the  Bible  always  speaks 
of  the  black  tents  of  Kedar.  They  are  black  because  they 
are  woven  from  goat's  hair  which  is  used  also  for  their 
garments  and  is  almost  as  good  a  waterproof  covering  as 
india  rubber.  But  when  you  have  to  spend  a  long  hot  day 
under  such  a  roof  as  I  have  done  you  feel  sorry  for  the 
Arabs  that  they  have  no  better  protection  against  the  blazing 

58 


PICTURED    FOR    CHILDREN 

ARABIA 

sun.  Everything  is  home-made  and  clumsy,  but  shall  I  tell 
you  what  I  have  found  ?  There  is  no  warmer  hospitality 
in  all  the  wide  world  than  in  these  tents  of  Kedar.  A  few 
weeks  ago  I  spent  a  Sabbath  day  resting  by  the  way  in  one 
of  these  tents.  The  women  brought  water  to  cool  my  head ; 
a  great  bowl  of  camel's  milk  was  our  drink  even  before  they 
asked  our  errand;  and  at  night  they  killed  a  fat  kid  and 
made  a  guest  meal  fit  for  an  epicure. 

The  Arabs  of  the  desert  are  more  ignorant  than  those  of 
the  towns,  but  they  are  much  kinder  to  strangers  and  treat 
their  wives  and  children  better.  Their  life  is  rather  mo- 
notonous, but  they  enjoy  it.  Like  the  American  Indians  they 
prefer  a  tent  to  a  house,  and  would  rather  change  their  home 
every  day  than  settle  down  as  farmers.  When  pasture  fails 
for  their  flocks  of  sheep  the  chief  gives  notice  and  on  the 
morrow  the  whole  camp  has  moved  away.  Some  tribes 
move  every  month  and  go  for  a  long  distance  to  find  fresh 
pastures. 

The  Bedouin  are  divided  into  many  tribes  and  clans. 
Some  of  them  are  friendly  to  each  other  but  nearly  all  are  at 
war  with  one  another  all  the  year  round.  Robbery  and 
murder  are  very  frequent.  Every  one  goes  armed  with  a 
long  spear  or  with  a  gun,  and  many  carry  a  war  club  and  a 
sword  as  well.  The  largest  Arab  tribes  and  the  wealthiest 
are  the  Anae\e  and  the  Shommar.  They  have  many  fine 
horses.  In  the  picture  you  see  a  group  of  them  armed  with 
their  long  spears.  The  spear  of  the  leader  is  ornamented 
with  a  tuft  of  ostrich  feathers;  these  spears  are  often  over 
twelve  feet  long  and  have  a  sharp  steel  lance  at  the  end. 

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ARABIA 

The  Arabs  are  fond  of  games,  especially  galloping  their 
horses  and  playing  at  war.  They  are  very  skillful  riders  and 
kind  to  their  steeds;  they  do  not  spend  much  time  in 
grooming  them  and  they  never  use  a  whip  and  seldom  a 
bit.  Their  bridle  is  like  our  halter  strap,  and  the  horse  is 
so  well  trained  that  he  needs  no  iron  bit  in  his  mouth. 

One  of  the  most  interesting  of  all  the  Arab  tribes  is  called 
the  Suleibi.  They  are  despised  by  all  the  other  Arabs  and 
seem  to  be  of  a  different  race.  The  women  of  this  tribe  are 
remarkable  for  their  beauty  and  the  men  for  their  skill  as 
blacksmiths  and  tinkers.  They  are  always  sought  after  to 
do  the  tinkering  for  the  Arabs  of  all  other  tribes.  They 
have  no  camels  or  horses  but  ride  little  donkeys  and  dress 
in  gazelle  skins.  Some  people  think  that  this  tribe  is  a 
remnant  of  the  Christian  population  of  Arabia;  they  have 
many  curious  beliefs  and  their  name  means,  "  Those-of-the- 
Cross."  Perhaps  some  day  a  missionary  will  bring  them 
back  to  a  true  knowledge  of  the  Crucified  One. 

The  nomads  of  Arabia  are  happy  in  springtime  when 
there  is  enough  grass  for  their  flocks  and  the  wells  of  the 
desert  are  full  of  water.  But  after  the  long  summer  drought 
there  is  often  a  great  scarcity  of  food  and  even  famine  in 
many  parts  of  Arabia.  Then  the  nomads  eat  anything  and 
drink  the  brackish  water  from  the  bottom  of  a  mud  pool 
with  relish.  In  no  country  in  the  world  is  water  so  costly 
as  in  Arabia;  nowhere  is  it  so  carefully  used:  an  Arab  never 
wastes  a  drop  of  water  and  looks  surprised  and  pained 
when  an  European  traveller  rinses  out  a  cup  before  drink- 
ing!    The  nomad  Arabs  eat  locusts  and  wild  honey  as  did 

61 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

A  R  A  B  I  A 

John  the  Baptist.  But  I  have  also  seen  them  eat  the  big 
lizards  of  the  desert  and  the  jerboas — a  sort  of  desert  rat. 
An  Arab  once  stood  amidst  a  circle  of  jewellers  at  Busrah 
and  said:  "On  one  occasion  I  had  missed  my  way  in  the 
desert,  and  having  no  road-provision  left,  I  had  given  my- 
self up  for  lost,  when  all  at  once  1  found  a  bag  of  pearls. 
Never  shall  I  forget  that  relish  and  delight  so  long  as  I  mis- 


PEARL  MERCHANTS. 

took  them  for  parched  wheat;  nor  that  bitterness  and  disap- 
pointment when  I  discovered  that  they  were  real  pearls!" 
This  story  is  told  by  a  Persian  poet  and  although  it  may  not 
be  true  yet  it  teaches  a  lesson.  To  a  hungry  man  a  handful 
of  wheat  is  better  than  all  the  pearls  of  the  ocean. 

In  his  tent  the  Arab  is  very  lazy.     His  only  occupation  is 
feeding  his  horses  or  milking  his  camels.     The  Arab  girls 

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ARABIA 

go  out  to  take  care  of  the  flocks  while  the  wife  performs  all 
the  domestic  duties.  She  grinds  wheat  in  the  hand-mill; 
kneads  and  bakes  bread;  makes  butter  by  shaking  the  milk 
in  a  leather  bag;  fetches  water  in  a  skin;  works  at  the 
loom  and  is  busy  all  the  time.  The  Arab  smokes  his  pipe, 
drinks  coffee  and  talks  to  his  friends;  unless  he  is  on  the 
march  or  on  a  robbery  excursion  his 
life  seems  very  lazy. 

Scarcely  any  of  the  Bedouin  can 
read,  and  they  have  neither  schools 
nor  mosques.  The  Bedouin  some- 
times say,  "Mohammed's  religion 
cannot  have  been  intended  for  us;  it 
demands  washings,  but  we  have  no 
water;  alms,  but  we  have  no  money; 
pilgrimage  to  Mecca,  but  we  are 
always  wandering  and  God  is  every- 
where." Yet  outwardly  they  ob- 
serve the  Moslem  religion  of  which 
they  know  so  little.  In  our  next 
chapter  you  will  read  how  earnestly 
even  the  nomad  children  pray  in  the 
desert.  And  I  believe  God  loves  these  sons  of  Ishmael 
and  will  yet  bring  them  back  to  Abraham's  faith.  Don't 
you  think  so  too  ? 


ARABIAN  WATER-BOTTLE. 


63 


X 

NOORAHS  PRAYER 

For  many  days  the  sailing  craft  from  Bahrein  had  been 
unloading  Indian  wares  at  the  port  of  Ojeir  on  the  Hassa 
coast,  and  for  many  hours  the  busy  throng  of  Bedouin 
drivers  and  merchants  and  onlookers  were  loading  the  cara- 
van, emphasising  their  task  or  their  impatience  with  great 
oaths,  almost  as  guttural  and  angry  as  the  noise  of  the 
camels.  At  length,  with  the  pious  cry  of  Tawakalna,  "  we 
have  trusted  in  God,"  they  are  off. 

A  caravan  is  composed  of  companies,  and  while  the 
whole  host  numbered  seven  hundred  camels,  with  mer- 
chants and  travellers  and  drivers,  our  company  from  Ojeir 
to  Hofhoof  counted  only  six.  There  was  Salih  and  Nasir, 
a  second  son  of  the  desert,  both  from  Riad;  a  poor  unfortu- 
nate lad  with  stumpy  hands  and  feet,  who  limped  about  on 
rag  shoes  and  seemed  quite  happy;  there  was  Noorah  and 
her  sister,  and  lastly,  the  missionary. 

But  for  the  shuffling  of  the  desert  sand  and  the  whack  of 
a  driving  stick  the  caravan  marched  in  silence.  The  sun 
shone  full  in  our  faces  as  it  slowly  sank  in  the  west,  its  last 
rays  coloured  the  clouds  hanging  over  the  lowlands  of 
Hassa  a  bright  red,  and  when  it  disappeared  we  heard  the 
sheikhs  of  the  companies,  one  after  the  other,  call  to  prayer. 
Only  a  part  of  the  caravan  responded.  The  Turkish  soldiers 
on  horseback  kept  on  their  way;  the  most  pious  of  the  mer- 

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ARABIA 

chants  had  already  urged  their  beasts  ahead  of  the  rest  and 
had  finished  a  duty  that  interfered  with  a  speedy  journey 
and  the  first  choice  of  location  at  the  night  encampment; 
some  excused  themselves  by  quoting  a  Koran  text,  and 
others  took  no  notice  of  the  call.  Not  so  the  Bedouin  child 
Noorah  and  her  younger  sister.  They  had  trudged  on  foot 
four  long  hours,  armed  with  sticks  to  urge  on  that  lazy 
white  camel,  always  loitering  to  snatch  a  bite  of  desert- 
thorn  with  his  giant  jaws.  A  short  time  before  sunset  I 
saw  the  two  children  mount  the  animal  by  climbing  up  its 
neck,  as  only  Arabs  can,  but  now,  at  call  to  prayer  they  de- 
voutly slipped  down.  Hand  in  hand  they  ran  ahead  a  short 
distance,  shuffled  aside  some  sand  with  their  bare  feet, 
rubbed  some  on  their  hands,  (as  do  all  pious  Moslems  in  the 
absence  of  water),  faced  Mecca,  and  prayed. 

As  they  did  then,  so  at  sunrise  and  at  noon  and  at  four 
o'clock  and  sunset  and  when  the  evening  star  disappeared — 
five  times  a  day — they  prayed.  It  is  not  true,  as  is  generally 
supposed,  that  women  in  Moslem  lands  do  not  pray.  Only 
at  Mecca,  as  far  as  I  know,  of  all  Arabia,  are  they  allowed  a 
place  in  the  public  mosques,  but  at  home  a  larger  per  cent, 
observe  the  times  of  prayer  than  do  the  men. 

When  Noorah  had  ended  her  prayer  and  resumed  the  task 
of  ^belabouring  the  white  camel,  she  turned  to  me  with  a 
question,  "  Laish  ma  tesully  anta  ?"  which  with  Bedouin 
bluntness  means,  "  You,  why  don't  you  pray  ?"  The  ques- 
tion set  me  musing  half  the  night;  not,  I  confess,  about  my 
own  prayers,  but  about  hers.  Why  did  Noorah  pray  ? 
What  did  Noorah  pray  ?    Did  she  understand  that 

65 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 

Prayer  is  the  burden  of  a  sigh,  the  falling  of  a  tear, 
The  upward  glancing  of  the  eye  when  only  God  is  near, 

as  well  as  the  dead  formalism  of  the  mosque  ?  How  could  I 
answer  her  question  in  a  way  that  she  might  well  under- 
stand ?  And  if  hers,  too,  was  a  sincere  prayer,  as  I  believe, 
— the  prayer  of  an  ignorant  child  of  the  desert, — did  she 
pray  words  or  thoughts  ?  What  do  Noorah  and  her  more 
than  two  million  Bedouin  sisters  ask  of  God  five  times  daily  ? 
Leaving  out  vain  repetitions,  this  is  what  they  say: 

"In  the  name  of  God  the  Merciful,  the  Compassionate; 
Praise  be  to  God  who  the  two  worlds  made; 
Thee  do  we  entreat  and  Thee  do  we  supplicate; 
Lead  us  in  the  way  the  straight, 
The  way  of  those  whom  Thou  dost  compassionate, 
Not  of  those  on  whom  is  hate 
Nor  those  that  deviate.     Amen." 

It  is  the  first  chapter  of  the  Koran  and  is  used  by  Moslems 
as  we  use  the  Lord's  Prayer.  The  words  are  very  beautiful 
I  think,  don't  you? 

Whether  Noorah  understood  what  she  asked  I  know  not; 

but  to  me  who  saw  and  heard  in  the  desert  twilight,  (as 

under  like  conditions  to  you),  the  prayer  was  full  of  pathos. 

The  desert!  where  God  is,  and  where  but  for  His  mercy 

and  compassion  death  and  solitude  would  reign  alone;  the 

desert,  a  world  of  its  own  kind,  a  sea  of  sand,  with  no  life 

in  it  except  the  Living  One,  and  over  it  only  His  canopy  of 

stars— God  of  the  two  worlds!     And  to  that   God,  than 

whom  there  is  no  other,  and  whom  they  ignorantly  wor- 

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PICTURED   FOR  CHILDREN 

ARABIA 

ship,  these  sons  and  daughters  of  outcast  Ishmael  bow  their 
faces  in  the  dust  and  five  times  daily  entreat  and  supplicate 
to  be  led  aright  in  the  way  of  truth. 

They  ask  to  be  directed  into  the  straight  way,  but  oh 
how  crooked  is  the  way  of  God  which  Mohammed  taught 
in  his  book!  Sadder  still,  what  a  crooked  way  it  is  that 
the  Moslems  walk!  Impure  words,  lying  lips,  hands  that 
steal  and  feet  that  run  after  cruelty — these  are  what  chil- 
dren in  Arabia  possess.  But  I  dare  say  that  some  of  them 
are  really  sorry  for  their  sins  and  when  they  pray  like 
Noorah  in  the  desert  they  want  to  have  peace  and  pardon. 
Are  they  looking  unconsciously  perhaps  for  the  footprints 
in  the  desert  of  One  who  said,  "I  am  the  Way,  the  Truth 
and  the  Life"  ? 

Alas,  Noorah  and  her  many  sisters  (your  sisters,  too) 
have  never  seen  His  beauty  nor  heard  of  His  love!  They 
do  not  know  that  the  "way  of  those  whom  Thou  dost 
compassionate"  is  the  new  and  living  way  through  Christ's 
cross  and  death.  They  are  ignorant  of  the  awful  word, 
"He  that  believeth  not  on  the  Son  shall  not  see  life,  but 
the  wrath  of  God  abideth  on  him."  Has  God  the  Merciful 
then  not  heard  Noorah's  prayer?  Will  He  not  answer 
it  ?  Is  His  mercy  to  these  children  of  Abraham  clean  gone 
forever?  How  long  they  have  waited  and  how  many  of 
the  desert  children  are  now  sleeping  in  little  desert  graves! 
Do  you  not  think  God  wants  you  to  carry  the  gospel  to 
them  and  send  them  teachers  to  learn  the  way  of  Jesus  ? 

Think  of  Noorah's  question,  "  You,  why  don't  you 
pray?"     Think  of  Christ's  words,   "Go  tell  quickly." 

67 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 

"Arabia  the  Loved." 

There's  a  land  since  long  neglected, 

There's  a  people  still  rejected, 
But  of  truth  and  grace  elected, 

In  His  love  for  them. 

Softer  than  their  night  wind's  fleeting, 
Richer  than  their  starry  tenting, 

Stronger  than  their  sands  protecting, 
Is  His  love  for  them. 

To  the  host  of  Islam's  leading, 
To  the  slave  in  bondage  bleeding, 

To  the  desert  dweller  pleading, 
Bring  His  love  to  them. 

Through  the  promise  on  God's  pages, 
Through  His  work  in  history's  stages, 

Through  the  cross  that  crowns  the  ages, 
Show  His  love  to  them. 

With  the  prayer  that  still  availeth 
With  the  power  that  prevaileth, 

With  the  love  that  never  faileth, 
Tell  His  love  to  them. 

Till  the  desert's  sons  now  aliens, 
Till  its  tribes  and  their  dominions, 

Till  Arabia's  raptured  millions, 

Praise  His  love  of  them.  — J.  G.  L. 


68 


XI 
PICTURES  WITH  WORDS  ONLY 

You  already  know  many  curious  facts  about  the  people 
of  Topsy-turvy  Land.  Would  you  like  to  hear  something 
about  their  language  and  their  writing?  The  language  of 
this  land  is  very  old,  almost  as  old  as  its  camels  or  its 
desert  sands.  The  Moslems  even  go  so  far  as  to  say  that 
Adam  and  Eve  spoke  Arabic  in  Paradise  and  they  say  it  is 
called  the  language  of  the  angels.  It  is  written  from  right 
to  left  just  in  the  opposite  way  of  this  page  of  English 
writing.  The  Arabic  alphabet  has  twenty-eight  letters,  all 
of  which  are  considered  consonants.  There  are  marks  put 
above  and  below  the  line  to  show  the  sounds  of  the  vowels; 
just  as  we  wrote  the  word  potato  in  our  first  chapter. 

Arabic  grammar  is  much  more  difficult  than  English 
grammar,  and  even  the  boys  who  attend  the  big  Arabic 
college  of  El  Azhar  in  Cairo,  Egypt,  must  find  its  study  a 
bugbear.  Just  think  of  learning  fifteen  conjugations  instead 
of  the  much  smaller  number  in  Latin  or  Greek!  The  books 
used  in  Moslem  schools  would  look  very  crude  and  dull  to 
you  who  learnt  your  A,  B,  C,  from  an  illustrated  primer 
perhaps  with  coloured  pictures. 

Strict  Mohammedans  do  not  allow  their  boys  and  girls  to 
have  pictures  in  their  books,  because  they  say  all  pictures 
are  idols.  And  yet  the  love  for  beauty  and  the  desire  for 
ornament  on  the  written  or  printed  page  was  so  strong 

69 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

A  R  A  B  I  A 

with  the  Arabs  that  they  began  from  the  earliest  times  to 
use  their  alphabet  to  make  arabesques.  Arabesque  is  a  big 
word  and  it  really  means  an  Arab  picture.  But  these  pic- 
tures of  the  Arabs  (which  you  find  on  the  arches  of  old 
mosques,  in  books  and  on  tombstones)  are  ornaments  or 
designs  made  out  of  the  beautifully  curved  letters  of  the 
alphabet.  The  old  Arab  copyists  and  their  sculptors  wrote 
and  carved  the  words  of  the  Koran,  or  the  names  of  God, 
etc.,  in  all  sorts  of  ways  to  make  pictures  out  of  words  only, 
lest  they  break  the  law  of  their  prophet.  Here  are  two 
examples   of  how   pictures   can   be   made   out  of  letters. 


DESIGNS  MADE  OUT  OF  ARABIC  WRITING. 


You  have  all  doubtless  heard  of  a  "  wordless  book";  and 
some  of  you  have  books  without  words  and  full  of  pic- 
tures. Here  is  a  picture  made  out  of  the  Arabic  alphabet, 
and  every  curve  and  dot  belongs  to  the  words  so  curiously 
written.  I  copied  them  out  of  an  Arabic  treatise  on  pen- 
manship, for  you.  The  face  is  not  at  all  pretty,  and  yet 
Moslem  lads  think  it  is  very  clever  to  bring  this  likeness  of 
man  out  of  the  four  names,  Allah,  Mohammed,  All  and 
Hassan.    These  words  you  notice  are  written  twice,  both 

70 


PICTURED    FOR    CHILDREN 

ARABIA 

to  the  left  and  to  the  right.  What  a  disgrace  to  the  holy 
name  of  God  to  put  that  of  three  Arabs  with  it  in  a  mono- 
graph! It  is  very  sad  to  hear  some  Moslems  say  that  they 
trust  in  these  people  to  intercede  for  them  with  God.  If 
you  have  read  what  sinful  lives  these  people  led  when  they 
were  the  chief  rulers  in  Arabia,  you  will  almost  agree  with 
me  in  calling  this  first  picture  a  Moslem  idol. 

There  are  many  Moslems  in  Bahrein  who  have  hanging 
up  in  their  rooms  these  monograms  or  designs.  One 
favourite  I  have  often  seen  contains  only  five  names: 
Allah,  Mohammed,  AH,  Hassan  and  Hussein.  The  people 
who  make  so  much  of  these  descendants  of  Mohammed 
are  called  Shiahs ;  the  other  Moslems  who  think  they  are 
more  orthodox  are  called  Sunnites. 

What  do  you  think  of  our  second  picture?  Is  not 
the  design  very  pretty  for  an  embroidery  pattern?  The 
motto  is  written  twice;  once  from  the  right  and  once 
backward  from  the  left,  the  same  as  in  the  other  picture. 
The  words  are  taken  from  the  Koran  and  are  as  true  as  they 
are  beautiful.  Man  yatlawakil  ala  Allah  fa  hooa  hasbahoo  ; 
which  means,  "Whoever  trusts  in  God  will  find  Him  suf- 
ficient." That  surely  contradicts  the  other  picture,  does  it 
not?  And  yet  they  are  both  from  the  same  copy-book. 
There  are  many  contradictions  in  the  religion  of  Mohammed. 
I  only  hope  that  when  Christ's  gospel  has  conquered  Arabia, 
the  name  of  Jesus  will  be  written  on  every  mosque  and  in 
every  heart;  then  contradiction  will  give  way  to  the  truth, 
and  whoever  trusts  in  Christ  will  find  Him  sufficient. 

Would  it  not  be  nice  to  make  something  pretty  for  use  in 

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TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 

the  home  or  in  the  Sunday-school,  and  embroider  the 
Arabic  words  on  it  ?  It  would  be  a  constant  reminder  of 
Arabia  and  of  the  beautiful  motto— only  an  Arabic  version 
of  Paul's  words,  Our  sufficiency  is  of  God. 

Our  last  illustration  to  close  this  chapter  is  an  example  of 
Arabic  every-day  penmanship.  It  was  written  in  the  moun- 
tains of  Oman,  and  is  a  letter  from  a  poor  cripple  asking  for 
a  copy  of  the  Psalms  and  other  books.  It  was  sent  to  our 
brother  Peter  J.  Zwemer  a  year  before  he  died,  when  he  was 
on  a  missionary  journey  in  Oman. 


S9\rx&.Ji*\\\Z.\\ 


ARABIC  LETTER  FROM  A  POOR  CRIPPLE. 


72 


XII 


THE  QUEER  PENNIES  OF  OMAN  AND  OF  HASSA 

If  Jesus  Himself,  on  one  occasion,  said,  "Show  me  a 
penny,"  and  preached  a  sermon  from  it,  surely  we  may 
follow  his  example  and  learn  something  from  these  strange 
coins  which  you  see  in  the  pictures  at  the  beginning  and  end 
of  this  chapter.  The  coin  on  this  page  comes  from  Oman, 
the  home  of  the  Arabian  camel  and  one  of  its  most  fertile 
provinces.  Perhaps  some  of  the  boys  and  girls  can  tell 
where  Oman  is  and  give  its  boundaries  without  looking  in 
the  geography,  but  I  am  sure  none  of  you  can  read  the 
inscription  on  the  penny,  and  tell  what  it  all  means.  Who 
is  Fessul  bin  Turkee  ?    What  is  an  Imam  ?    How  much  is 


OMAN  COIN. 

one-quarter  of  an  Anna  ?    And  when  did  this  queer  coin 
come  fresh  from  the  mint  ? 

Let  us  begin  at  the  beginning.  Fessul  bin  Turkee, 
the  present  ruler  of  Oman,  lives  in  a  large,  tumble-down 
old  castle  in  Muscat,  and  his  big  red  flag  waves  over  the 
town  every  Friday,  the  Mohammedan  Sabbath.     He  is  not 

73 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 

much  better  nor  worse  than  his  father,  Turkee,  or  than 
other  rulers  in  Arabia,  but  he  certainly  is  far  more  enter- 
prising, and  is  generally  liked  by  the  Arabs  of  Muscat.  He 
is  not  however  in  all  respects  a  merciful  ruler.  When  I 
visited  Muscat  a  few  years  ago  this  petty  king  had  a  real 
lion's  den,  like  Nebuchadnezzar,  and  the  story  goes  that  he 
sometimes  used  it  in  the  same  way  to  get  rid  of  his  enemies. 
He  once  had  a  steam-launch,  and  even  put  up  an  electric 
light  on  the  top  of  his  castle,  but  both  of  these  modern 
improvements  came  to  grief.  He  also  started  a  small  ice 
factory  to  supply  his  household  with  cold  water  when  the 
thermometer  rises  to  over  one  hundred  degrees;  but  the 
expense  was  too  great  and  so  the  project  melted  away  like- 
wise. His  last  venture  is  more  successful,  and  ever  since 
the  ice  factory  added  a  P  to  its  sign-board  and  became  a 
"pice  factory,"  copper  coins  have  been  plentiful  in  Oman. 
A  pice  is  the  Indian  name  for  a  small  copper  coin,  and  the 
Arabs  borrowed  the  word,  with  many  other  words,  from 
the  Hindu  traders.  The  Sultan  has  plenty  of  wives  and 
horses  and  retainers;  his  castle  is  well-supplied  with  old 
cannon  and  modern  rifles;  huge  coffee-pots  pour  out  cheap 
hospitality  every  day;  but  withal  I  do  not  think  he  is  very 
happy,  for  he  is  in  debt  and  his  power  is  not  as  extensive 
as  it  was  once.  Fessul's  proper  title  is  not  Sultan,  although 
he  is  often  so  called,  but  Imam,  which  signifies  religious 
leader.  It  is  the  old  title  given  to  the  political  chiefs  of 
Oman  and  Zanzibar. 

The  word  means  one  "  who  stands  before,''  and  was  first 
used  as  a  title  for  the  leader  of  prayer  in  the  mosques.     In 

74 


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ARABIA 

Oman  the  religious  chiefs  soon  took  hold  of  politics,  and  so 
the  title  has  a  significance  now  in  this  part  of  Arabia  that  it 
never  had  elsewhere. 

Let  us  get  back  to  the  penny.  Its  face  (although  being  a 
Mohammedan  coin  it  really  has  no  human  face  because  their 
religion  forbids  pictures)  bears  an  English  as  well  as  an  Arabic 
inscription.  The  opposite  side  only  has  the  Sultan's  name 
in  Arabic.  On  the  side  that  has  the  English  words  is  the 
legend:  "Struck  at  Muscat  in  the  year  1315."  Yet  the 
penny  is  only  three  years  old,  for  the  Moslems  begin  to  date 
their  years  from  the  Hegira,  or  flight  of  their  prophet  from 
Mecca  to  Medina.  This  took  place  in  the  year  622  a.  d. 
But  we  must  also  remember  that  their  year  is  several  days 
shorter  than  ours,  because  they  have  lunar  months  all  of 
equal  length  and  only  360  days  in  a  year. 

How  strange  it  is  to  read  such  an  old  date  for  such  a 
recent  year  as  1899,  since  we  count  time  from  the  birth  of 
Christ!  But  you  must  remember  that  the  False  Prophet  has 
had  it  all  his  own  way  in  Arabia  for  thirteen  hundred  years, 
and  that  the  missionaries  in  this  country  are  very  few 
indeed.  Only  for  a  very  few  years  and  in  a  very  few  places 
has  Christ  been  preached. 

Now,  however,  even  this  queer  little  penny  can  bear 
witness  to  the  fact  that  the  gospel  has  come  to  Oman.  It 
is  worth  one-quarter  of  an  anna;  there  are  sixteen  annas  in 
a  rupee,  and  a  rupee  is  worth  about  thirty-three  cents.  Not 
a  big  value,  is  it  ?  But  for  four  of  these  coins  the  poorest 
boy  in  Muscat  can  buy  a  complete  gospel  of  Matthew.  The 
shopkeeper  must  take  in  a  great  many  of  them,  for  last 

75 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 

year  one  thousand  four  hundred  and  thirty-three  such  gospels 
and  other  portions  of  the  Bible  were  sold  in  this  part  of 
Arabia  and  paid  for  by  these  coppers. 

Another  interesting  fact  to  notice  is  that  part  of  the 
inscription  on  the  coin  is  English.  Coming  events  cast 
their  shadows  before.  England's  power  in  checking  the 
cruel  slave  trade  and  rooting  out  piracy  on  the  coasts  of 
Arabia  has  made  its  influence  felt.  An  English  primer  is 
sure  to  follow  a  penny  with  an  English  motto,  and  some 
day  our  mission  will  have  a  school  at  Muscat  for  Arab  boys 
and  girls,  as  well  as  for  rescued  slaves.  Your  American 
pennies  and  your  prayers  will  help  to  bring  it  about. 
Moreover,  do  you  not  think  that  if  they  keep  on  buying 
gospels  and  reading  them,  Jesus  Christ  will  some  time  be 
the  true  Imam  of  Muscat  and  Oman  ? 

The  other  coin  is 
the  only  old  coin 
that  is  at  present 
current  in  Arabia, 
and  I  leave  you  to 
decide  whether  it  is 
not  the  oddest  and 
queerest  penny  you 
have  ever  seen. 
The  first  time  I  saw 
these  queer  black- 
smith-nail coins  was  in  1893,  when  I  made  a  visit  to  Hof- 
hoof,    the    capital    of  the   province   of   Hassa,    in   Eastern 

Arabia.     The  people  used  them,  as  we  do  pennies,  for  all 

76 


b 


\ 


<. 


HASSA   COINS. 


PICTURED    FOR    CHILDREN 

ARABIA 

small  purchases,  but  I  fear  such  a  pointed  coin  must  have 
been  harder  on  their  pockets  than  our  round  coins.  It  is 
called  the  Taweelah,  or  long-bit,  and  consists  of  a  small 
copper-bar  of  about  an  inch  in  length,  split  at  one  end  and 
with  the  fissure  slightly  opened.  The  coin  has  neither  date 
nor  motto,  although  one  can  yet  occasionally  find  silver 
coins  of  like  shape  with  the  Arabic  motto:  "Honour  to 
the  sober  man,  dishonour  to  the  ambitious."  The  coin, 
although  it  has  no  date,  was  undoubtedly  made  by  one  of 
the  Carmathian  rulers  about  the  year  920  a.  d.  This  was 
more  than  five  hundred  years  before  Columbus  discovered 
America!  The  Carmathians  were  a  very  fanatical  sect  of 
Moslems.  You  remember  reading  in  chapter  three  how 
they  took  the  black  stone  from  Mecca  ? 

Well,  these  people  had  this  province  as  the  centre  of  their 
power  and  here  they  struck  these  peculiar  coins.  I  have 
heard  it  said  that  they  were  so  opposed  to  images  and  faces 
on  money  that  their  leader  devised  this  long  bar-like  shape 
for  his  coins  to  prevent  any  one  from  making  images  on 
them! 

At  any  rate  the  Carmathians  were  very  brave  warriors. 
When  Abu  Tahir,  their  first  leader,  attacked  Bagdad  with 
only  500  horsemen  he  was  met  by  a  messenger  from  the 
city  saying  that  30,000  soldiers  were  guarding  the  gates. 
"Yes,"  said  Abu  Tahir,  "but  among  them  all  there  are  not 
three  such  as  these."  At  the  same  instant  he  turned  to 
three  of  his  companions  commanding  one  to  plunge  a 
dagger  into  his  own  breast,  another  to  leap  into  the  rushing 
Tigris  river  and  the  third  to  cast  himself  down  a  precipice. 

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TOPSY-TURVY     LAND 

ARABIA 

They  obeyed  without  a  murmur.  "  Relate,"  continued  the 
general,  "what  you  have  just  seen;  before  evening  your 
leader  shall  be  chained  among  my  dogs."  No  wonder  that 
with  such  absolute  obedience,  the  Carmathians  terrified  all 
Arabia  with  their  army. 

As  I  handle  their  old  coins  and  think  of  the  past,  I  some- 
times wonder  how  much  Our  Great  Captain,  Christ  Jesus 
would  accomplish  had  He  soldiers  equally  obedient  and 
brave  as  did  the  Carmathian  general,  in  redeeming  Arabia 
from  its  long  darkness  and  bloodshed.  It  is  nineteen  hun- 
dred years  ago  that  He  commanded  us:  "Go  ye  into  all 
the  world  and  preach  the  gospel." 

But  even  now  there  is  no  one  preaching  the  gospel  in 
Hassa  nor  in  all  the  interior  of  Arabia.     Why  ? 


78 


XIII 

ARAB  BABIES  AND  THEIR  MOTHERS 

An  Arab  baby  is  such  a  funny  little  creature!  In  Chris- 
tian lands  babies,  as  soon  as  possible,  are  given  a  warm 
bath  and  dressed  with  comfortable  clothing.  But  in  Arabia 
the  babies  are  not  washed  for  many  days,  only  rubbed  over 
with  a  brown  powder  and  their  tiny  eyelids  painted  round 
with  collyrium.  They  are  wound  up  in  a  piece  of  calico 
and  tied  up  with  a  string,  just  like  a  package  of  sugar. 
Their  arms  are  fastened  by  the  bandage  so  that  they  cannot 
possibly  move  them.  The  Arab  mothers  say  that  if  the 
arms  and  legs  of  babies  were  left  hanging  loose  the  poor 
things  would  never  sleep,  A  small,  tight  bonnet  for  the 
head  completes  the  baby's  wardrobe.  A  few  blue  beads  or 
buttons  are  sewn  on  the  front  of  this  cap  to  keep  off  the 
evil-eye,  for  Moslem  women  all  believe  that  if  a  stranger 
looks  at  a  baby  it  may  turn  sick  and  die. 

On  the  day  when  the  baby  is  named  a  sacrifice  is  slain 
and  eaten  and  silver  offerings  are  given  to  the  poor,  equal 
to  the  weight  of  hair  on  the  infant's  head.  The  poor  baby's 
hair  is  all  shaved  off  to  be  weighed  in  the  balance.  Poor 
people  who  cannot  afford  this  offering  omit  the  custom. 
Charms  are  placed  on  the  arms  or  around  the  neck  of 
the  child.  A  few  verses  from  the  Koran  are  written  out 
and  put  in  a  leather  or  silver  case  and  also  tied  around  the 
arm  or  neck  of  the  baby.     If  the  child  shows  signs  of  ill— 

79 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 

ness  the  mother  makes  it  swallow  some  of  the  Koran. 
That  is,  a  portion  is  written  out  and  the  ink  is  washed  off 
with  water  and  this  dirty  water  is  taken  by  the  patient.  A 
prescription  was  sent  to  me  once  when  I  was  ill  by  a  Mos- 
lem mullah,  or  teacher,  of  this  character  and  he  was  quite 
certain  I  would  recover  if  I  drank  it.  I  am  glad  to  say  I  got 
better  without  the  ink  medicine. 

When  the  baby  is  forty  days  old  and  has  received  its 
name  a  new  date-stick  cradle  is  triumphantly  brought  home 


DATE-STICK   CRADLE. 

from  the  market  and  the  new  baby  placed  in  it.  And  then 
Master  or  Miss  Arab  will  get  such  a  violent  rocking  that  no 
Christian  baby  could  stand.  The  ground  is  uneven,  for 
there  are  no  wooden  floors  in  Arabia,  and  the  rockers  are 
nearly  straight  so  that  you  can  imagine  it  is  not  the  pleas- 
antest  thing  in  the  world  to  be  rocked  in  an  Arab  cradle.  In 
the  picture  you  can  see  just  what  a  date-stick  cradle  is  like. 

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ARABIA 

Arab  babies  cry  a  great  deal;  what  with  sand  storms  and 
flies  and  other  insects  they  generally  have  sore  eyes  and 
apparently  need  strong  treatment  to  make  them  quiet  and 
give  their  mothers  and  sisters  time  to  grind  the  wheat  and 
churn  the  butter.  Everything  is  made  fresh  each  day  in  an 
Arab  household.  The  rice  must  be  cooked  for  the  daily 
meal,  the  wheat  ground  for  bread,  and  the  milk  put  into 
the  leather  churn.  These  people  have  no  ice  chest,  not  even 
cupboards,  many  of  them,  so  the  coffee  is  freshly  roasted 
and  pounded  in  a  mortar  for  breakfast.  The  flour  is  taken 
to  the  hand-mill  and  butter  comes  out  of  the  churn  every 
day  fresh.  Then  the  mother  will  have  to  draw  the  daily 
supply  of  water  and  wash  the  few  clothes  at  the  well. 
The  better  classes  have  their  slaves  to  do  the  hard  work  but 
the  Bedouin  women  and  the  poor  have  to  do  all  the  toil  and 
never  get  a  rest.  Rich  and  poor  are  alike  in  not  having  any 
intellectual  pleasures.  Few  can  read  and  even  those  who 
can  read,  are  able  to  read  only  the  Koran  and  the  Moslem 
traditions.  The  children  have  no  primers  or  picture-books, 
and  no  Arab  mother  ever  has  a  newspaper  or  a  magazine. 
She  has  never  heard  of  such  things.  Arab  women  do  not 
know  anything  of  the  many  interests  and  pleasures  that 
occupy  the  time  of  women  in  Christian  lands. 

Would  you  like  to  know  how  they  make  bread  in 
Arabia?  First  the  wheat  is  sifted  and  cleaned  and  then 
it  is  put  into  one  of  the  hand-mills.  It  consists  of  an 
upper  and  nether  millstone  with  a  hole  in  the  upper  one 
and  a  wooden  handle.  Two  women  usually  sit  and 
grind  because  the  stone  is   heavy   and  they   love  to  talk 

81 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 

while  they  work.  One  swings  it  half  way  and  the  other 
pulls  it  around.  Then  the  coarse  flour  is  taken  out  and  put 
into  a  bowl  with  water  and  salt  and  mixed  to  the  right  con- 


WOMEN  GRINDING  AT  THE  MILL. 
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ARABIA 

sistency.  A  piece  of  this  dough  is  then  taken  between  the 
hands  and  gradually  beaten  until  it  is  about  the  thickness  of 
a  book  cover  and  twelve  inches  in  diameter — a  round,  flat 
cake  of  dough.  The  oven  is  usually  under  ground  and  is 
shaped  like  a  large  jar  with  the  mouth  above  the  ground  a 
little.  A  fire  is  built  inside  the  oven  and  when  the  sides  of 
the  oven  are  quite  hot  the  fire  is  allowed  to  die  out.  Then 
the  large  pan  cakes  of  bread  are  deftly  clapped  on  to  the 
side  of  the  oven  until  the  space  is  covered  and  one  by  one 
the  cakes  are  taken  out  when  done.  In  some  houses  they 
have  a  shallow  oval  pan  which  is  placed  over  an  open  fire 
and  on  this  the  cakes  are  baked.  The  pan  is  put  on  the  fire 
upside  down,  so  even  here  we  are  again  in  Topsy-turvy  Land. 
Twenty  or  thirty  of  these  flat  loaves  are  baked  at  one  time, 
for  a  hungry  Arab  can  eat  five  or  six  at  one  meal. 

Now  the  men  come  in  to  eat  the  food  that  the  housewife 
has  prepared.  With  a  short  prayer  called  bismillah  they 
begin  and  then  shove  the  rice  and  meat  or  the  bread  and 
gravy  into  their  mouths  as  fast  as  they  can.  Whatever  is 
left  when  the  men  get  through  is  for  the  women.  You  can 
see  a  group  of  Arab  women  in  the  picture  eating  their  meal 
from  one  common  dish  in  front  of  their  tent.  They  use 
their  hands  instead  of  spoons  or  forks  but  get  along  very 
well  and  always  wash  before  and  after  their  simple  meal. 

Now  the  women  always  have  to  wait  on  their  husbands 
and  eat  by  themselves.  When  things  get  right  side  up  in 
this  dark  land  we  hope  to  see  the  whole  family  sitting 
down  together  and  taking  their  meal  with  joy  and  thanks- 
giving. 

84 


XIV 
BOAT-BUILDERS  AND  CARPENTERS 

Sinbad  the  sailor  died  long  ago  but  the  sea  he  sailed  is 
still  called  the  Persian  Gulf  and  is  just  as  full  of  curious 
islands  as  it  was  in  his  time.  The  boats  are  also  just  like 
Sinbad's  and  the  sailors  sing  the  same  songs,  I  think,  for 
there  are  very  few  changes  in  the  almost  changeless  East. 
The  Bahrein  harbour-boat  is  built  on  the  islands,  out  of 
timber  from  India  and  masts  from  Ceylon.  But  the  sail- 
cloth and  the  ropes  are  made  on  this  our  island  home.  All 
boats  of  this  kind  carry  a  good  lot  of  passengers,  draw 
very  little  water  and  are  fast  sailing  craft;  so  that  even  the 
American  boy  whose  father  owns  a  yacht  would  not  speak 
with  contempt  of  one  of  these  boats.  In  fact  I  have  heard 
English  sea  captains  who  had  drunk  salt  water  for  years 
say  that  they  never  saw  better  harbour  boats  in  a  storm 
than  these  of  Bahrein. 

In  another  kind  of  boat  the  pearl-divers  of  the  Gulf  go 
out  to  their  hard  toil  and  costly  labour.  One  of  them 
costs  about  four  hundred  rupees,  that  is  about  one  hundred 
and  thirty  dollars.  You  do  not  think  that  is  dear,  do  you, 
for  a  boat  that  holds  a  crew  of  twenty  ?  But  the  cost 
of  diving  for  pearls  is  not  in  the  boat  or  the  apparatus; 
it  costs  lives.  Many  of  the  divers  are  eaten  by  sharks 
before  they  return  with  the  year's  pearl  harvest;  others 
lose  limbs  and  health.      I  wish  you  could  see  the  odd 

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A  R  A  B  I  A 

shaped  oars  the  Arabs  use  in  these  boats.  They  consist  of 
a  round  pole  with  a  sort  of  barrel-head  or  spoon  shaped 
board  tied  to  one  end.  The  boat  builders  always  use  twine 
and  rope  rather  than  nails  or  screws  to  put  their  boats  to- 
gether. The  boys  of  Bahrein  can  make  beautiful  sailing 
boats  to  play  with  out  of  bits  of  date-stick  and  strings. 


RIVER  BOAT,  BUSRAH. 


Each  fishing  boat  has  a  sort  of  figure-head  and  this  is 
generally  covered  with  the  skin  of  a  sheep  or  goat.  This 
animal  is  sacrificed  on  the  day  when  the  boat  is  first 
launched,  just  as  we  give  the  boat  a  name  and  put  flags  on 
it.  It  is  a  very  old  custom  to  offer  a  blood  sacrifice  when  a 
boat  is  first  put  into  the  water. 

87 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 

Not  only  in  the  villages  on  the  coasts  of  the  Red  Sea  and 
the  Persian  Gulf  are  there  boat  builders  and  sailors;  Arabia 
has  two  large  rivers  that  help  to  make  its  northern  boundary 
and  they  are  highways  of  traffic. 

Our  picture  shows  a  river  boat  on  the  canal  at  Busrah.  It 
goes  the  long  journey  from  Busrah  to  Bagdad  over  five 
hundred  miles  or  even  to  Hillah  and  the  other  towns  on  the 
Euphrates  river.  This  kind  of  boat  has  a  cabin  in  the  bow 
and  can  carry  a  large  cargo  of  wheat  or  wool.  It  sails  by 
all  the  interesting  country  which  was  once  the  home  of 
Abraham  and  is  still  called  Mesopotamia. 

The  largest  boats  used  by  the  Arabs  are  called  dhows  or 
buggalows.  You  will  hear  something  more  about  these 
boats  in  the  chapter  on  the  slave  trade. 

The  carpenters  of  Arabia,  like  the  boat  builders,  work  in 
a  very  old-fashioned  way.  But  they  are  much  less  skillful 
in  their  work.  You  often  see  well-built  boats  but  never  a 
well-made  door  or  a  window  that  shuts  properly.  Perhaps 
the  fault  is  with  their  tools  and  perhaps  they  are  not  as 
skillful  as  they  once  were  in  using  them. 

The  Arab  carpenter  uses  no  bench  or  vise;  he  squats  upon 
the  ground  in  the  shade  of  some  old  building  or  tree  and 
carries  all  his  tools  in  a  small  basket  with  him.  He  has 
four  hands  instead  of-  the  two  hands  of  an  American 
carpenter,  for  his  feet  are  bare  and  he  can  work  as  well 
with  his  toes  as  you  can  with  your  fingers.  It  is  wonderful 
to  see  how  an  Arab  carpenter  can  hold  a  board  with  his 
toes  while  his  hands  are  busy  sawing  or  planing  it! 

I  never  see  one  of   these  carpenters  using  his  toes  so 

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PICTURED    FOR    CHILDREN 

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cleverly  without  thinking  that  we  who  wear  shoes  and 
stockings  and  only  use  our  feet  for  walking  have  lost  one  of 
the  powers  that  the  Arabs  still  possess,  A  carpenter's 
handsome  handiwork  in  Arabia  should  be  called  his  toesome 
toey-work;  don't  you  think  so  ?  In  the  picture  at  the  end  of 
this  chapter  you  see  an  Arab  carpenter's  tools.  His  saw  is 
exactly  opposite  to  an  ordinary  saw  as  the  teeth  all  point 
the  wrong  way!     But  you  know  he  pulls  the  tool  so  it  is 


SAWING  A  BEAM. 


all  right.  The  plane  has  four  handles  instead  of  one.  The 
gimlet  is  like  ours  but  instead  of  a  brace  and  bit  to  make 
holes,  the   Arab   uses   a  fiddle-string  stretched  on  a  bow 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 

which  he  twists  once  or  twice  around  his  borer,  or  auger- 
bit.     Then  he  fiddles  away  until  he  has  made  a  hole. 

It  is  very  strange  to  see  two  Arab  carpenters  sawing  a 
beam  as  you  find  them  in  the  picture. 

Time  is  not  valuable  in  the  East  because  the  days  are  long 
and  life  is  easy  and  the  people  are  never  in  a  hurry.  Never 
do  anything  to-day  that  can  be  done  to-morrow  is  their 
motto.  So  they  spend  a  half  hour  in  fixing  the  beam  on  a 
tripod;  then  they  pull  and  push  and  push  and  pull  the  great 
clumsy  saw  blade  up  and  down  and  in  an  hour  or  so  the 
beam  is  cut  in  two.  What  would  such  carpenters  say  if 
they  were  to  visit  an  American  sawmill  and  see  the  gang- 
saw  cut  six  boards  out  of  a  log  at  once  just  as  easy  as  youi 
mother  cuts  a  cheese  ?  Arabia  and  its  carpenters  are  very 
far  behind  us  in  civilisation.  The  whole  country  is  in  need 
of  schools  and  industrial  missions  so  that  the  Arab  boys 
may  learn  to  handle  tools  and  make  furniture  and  build 
houses. 

In  America  there  is  hardly  a  boy  living  but  he  can  drive  a 


AN  ARAB  CARPENTER'S  TOOLS. 
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PICTURED    FOR    CHILDREN 

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nail  and  saw  off  a  board  and  put  up  a  shelf.  In  Arabia  only 
carpenters'  sons  can  do  these  things;  the  ordinary  boy  does 
not  even  know  how  to  use  a  jack-knife;  he  never  had  one. 
A  short  definition  of  Arabia  would  be  "a  land  without 
tools."  Ritter,  the  great  geographer,  calls  Arabia  "the 
anti-industrial  centre  of  the  world,"  which  is  only  the  same 
definition  in  other  words. 


91 


XV 
ARABIC  PROVERBS  AND  ARABIC  HUMOUR 

The  people  of  Topsy-turvy  Land,  like  all  orientals,  are 
very  fond  of  proverbs  and  short,  bright  sayings.  You  know 
that  even  to-day  there  are  men  who  go  about  in  the  coffee 
shops  of  Arabia  to  tell  stories,  just  as  you  have  read  in  the 
Arabian  Nights.  Some  of  their  stories  are  very  interesting 
and  some  of  their  proverbs  are  wise.  Others  are  not  inter- 
esting and  many  of  their  stories  are  too  bad  to  repeat.  Even 
some  of  their  proverbs  bear  the  mark  of  their  topsy-turvy 
religion  and  are  only  half  true.  Judge  them  for  yourself. 
Here  are  fifty  examples;  which  do  you  think  is  the  best 
proverb  among  them  ?    Are  they  all  good  ? 

First  seek  your  neighbour,  then  build  your  house. 

First  get  a  companion,  then  go  on  the  road. 

Whoever  dies  in  a  strange  land,  dies  a  martyr. 

When  the  judge  is  oppressive,  the  very  air  is,  too. 

Don't  cut  your  head  off  with  your  tongue. 

Keep  your  dog  hungry  and  he  will  follow  you. 

Leave  off  sin,  then  ask  forgiveness. 

Every  horse  knows  its  rider. 

Talk  is  feminine,  but  a  good  answer  is  masculine. 

With  little  food  a  bed  tastes  good. 

A  trotting  dog  is  better  than  a  sleeping  lion. 

Every  girl  is  beautiful  in  her  father's  eyes. 

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PICTURED    FOR    CHILDREN 

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His  tongue  is  sweeter  than  dates  but  his  hands  are  as  hard 
as  sticks. 
There  is  no  perfume  after  the  wedding. 
Clouds  do  not  fear  the  barking  of  dogs. 
A  bird  catches  a  bird. 
Poverty  is  the  mother  of  deceptions. 
The  fruit  of  haste  is  repentance. 

That  man  is  like  the  Kaaba  ;  he  goes  nowhere  but  every 
one  comes  to  him. 
The  tongue  of  a  fool  is  the  key  to  his  destruction. 
The  needle  clothes  others  but  is  itself  naked. 
If  the  owl  were  game  to  eat,  the  gunner  would  not  have 
passed  by  the  ruined  castle. 

Happy  is  the  man  whose  enemy  is  wise. 

Time  is  stingy  of  honour. 

The  best  generosity  is  quick. 

If  your  neighbour  is  honey,  don't  lick  him  all  up. 

If  you  don't  know  a  man's  parents  look  at  his  appearance. 

What  a  strange  world  if  all  wool  were  red! 

Fall  but  don't  bawl. 

Your  enemy  will  love  you  when  the  ass  becomes   a 
doctor. 

Wait,  donkey,  till  the  grass  grows. 

A  loaned  garment  is  not  warm. 

He  is  a  hard  man;  his  name  is  Rock,  son  of  a  Cliff. 

The  oppression  of  a  cat  is  better  than  the  justice  of  a  rat. 

While  I  was  fishing,  I  was  caught. 

A  blacksmith  came  to  shoe  the  Pasha's  horse  and  a  frog 
in  the  pond  stuck  out  her  foot  too. 

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TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 

One  nettle  seed  will  ruin  a  garden. 

Who  speaks  the  whole  truth  will  get  a  broken  head. 

What's  the  good  of  a  house  without  food  ? 

Ask  experience  but  don't  neglect  the  doctor. 

She  wears  seven  veils  but  has  no  modesty. 

He  fasted  a  year  and  breakfasted  on  an  onion. 

A  false  friend  is  an  open  enemy. 

They  gave  me  no  food,  but  the  smoke  from  their  kitchen 
blinded  me. 

When  the  lion  is  away,  the  hyenas  play. 

They  said  to  the  blind  man,  throw  away  your  stick;  he 
replied,  why  desert  an  old  friend  ? 

Haste  is  of  the  devil;  deliberation,  of  God. 

They  put  the  dog's  tail  in  the  press  forty  years,  and  when 
it  came  out  it  still  had  a  curl. 

Lucky  days  do  not  come  in  a  bunch. 

Look  for  a  thing  where  you  lost  it. 

Some  of  these  resemble  our  own  proverbs  and  others  may 
perplex  you  at  first.  Of  course  they  are  all  better  in  Arabic 
than  in  the  translation.  The  people  of  Arabia  seldom  or 
never  engage  in  practical  jokes,  but  they  are  often  very 
witty  in  their  remarks.  The  Caliph  Mansur  once  met  an 
Arab  on  the  desert  and  said  to  him:  "  Give  thanks  to  God 
who  has  caused  the  plague  to  cease  that  ravaged  thy  coun- 
try." 

"God  is  too  good,"  the  Arab  answered,  "to  punish  us 
with  two  such  scourges  at  the  same  time  as  the  plague  and 
thy  government." 

An  Arab  poet  sent  his  book  to  a  famous  author.     "  Dost 

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PICTURED    FOR    CHILDREN 

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thou  want  fame?"  said  the  latter,  "then  hang  thy  book  up 
in  the  market-place  where  all  can  see  it." 

"  But  how  will  they  know  the  author  ?" 

"Why,  just  hang  yourself  close  to  the  book! " 

Here  is  another  story  that  is  told  about  a  Moslem  preacher. 
One  Friday  when  the  people  were  gathered  in  the  mosque 
to  pray  and  to  hear  the  sermon,  he  got  up  in  the  pulpit  and 
asked  the  audience  if  they  knew  what  he  intended  to  preach 
about. 

"No,"  they  replied. 

"Well,  then,  I  shall  not  tell  you,"  and  he  stepped  down. 
The  next   Friday  he   asked  the  same  question,  and  now, 
taught  by  experience,  they  answered: 
"Yes,  we  know." 

"Well,  then,  I  need  not  tell  you,"  and  again  he  stepped 
down. 

The  third  Friday  when  the  same  question  was  put,  the 
people  said,  "Some  of  us  know  and  some  don't  know." 

"In  that  case,"  said  the  preacher-wag,  "let  those  of  you 
who  know  tell  those  that  don't  know."  And  again  there 
was  no  sermon. 

And  now  to  close  this  chapter  here  is  a  very  topsy-turvy 
story  with  a  puzzle  in  it: 

The  Arabs  relate  that  when  the  prophet  Jonah  fled  from 
Joppa  to  Tarshish,  there  were  thirty  passengers,  all  told,  in 
the  ship.  The  storm  grew  very  fierce,  and  out  of  fear,  the 
captain  determined  to  throw  half  the  crew  overboard,  that  is, 
fifteen  men.  But  he  knew  that  fifteen  of  the  thirty  were 
true  believers,  and  fifteen  were  infidels,  and  among  them, 

95 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

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Jonah  also.  To  avoid  suspicion  and  accomplish  his  purpose 
he  put  the  thirty  men  all  in  a  row  in  such  a  way  that  by 
counting  out  every  ninth  man,  the  believers  alone  remained 
and  the  unbelievers  were  all  of  them  one  by  one  cast  into 
the  sea. 

This  is  the  way  he  arranged  them ;  every  dot  stands  for 
an  unbeliever,  and  the  strokes  for  believers— thirty  alto- 
gether. 

IMf il'fJI-J'*lf'--l'#ll- 

PUZZLE  OF  THE  THIRTY  MEN. 

You  begin  to  count  from  the  left,  as  the  captain  did,  and 
if  you  mark  out  every  ninth  man  you  can  keep- on  counting 
out  the  ninth  men  until  only  upright  strokes  are  left. 

From  your  knowledge  of  arithmetic,  can  you  tell  me  the 
reason  of  this  puzzle  ? 

The  Arabs  remember  the  puzzle  by  some  verses  in  which 
every  dotted  letter  stands  for  an  unbeliever  and  those  that 
have  no  dots  stand  for  Moslems. 

You  see  that  even  the  story  of  Jonah  and  the  whale  is 
topsy-turvy  out  in  Arabia! 


96 


XVI 

GOLD,  FRANKINCENSE  AND  MYRRH 

In  olden  times  Arabia  was  a  much  more  important 
country  than  it  is  to-day.  Before  there  were  large  sea- 
going ships,  all  the  trade  between  India,  Persia,  even  China, 
on  the  east,  and  Egypt  on  the  west,  was  carried  on  .camels. 
The  caravans  at  that  time  used  to  cross  Arabia  in  all 
directions,  and  the  men  who  drove  these  camel-trains  grew 
wealthy,  as  railroad  magnates  do  to-day.  We  read  about 
this  early  traffic  on  these  highways  of  the  desert  in  the  Old 
Testament  as  well  as  in  the  old  Greek  histories.  The  prov- 
ince of  Yemen  was  celebrated  for  its  wealth  and  civilisation 
as  early  as  the  time  of  Solomon.  It  was  then  called  Sheba 
and  -the  old  capital  was  called  Marib,  a  little'  northeast  of 
the  present  city  of  Sanaa.  There  are  still  many  extensive 
ruins  and  inscriptions  which  testify  to  the  height  of  their 
civilisation.  We  read  of  one  of  the  queens  of  Sheba  (the 
Arabs  say  she  was  named  Bilhis)  who  came  to  prove 
Solomon  with  hard  questions.  She  came  with  a  large 
caravan  of  camels  bearing  spices  and  gold  in  abundance; 
her  present  to  Solomon  consisted  of  "an  hundred  and 
twenty  talents  of  gold,  and  of  spices  great  abundance,  and 
precious  stones."  Gold  is  no  longer  found  in  Arabia  but  it 
was  undoubtedly  once  very  plentiful  there.  All  the  old 
writers  speak  of  Arabia  as  a  gold  country.  One  of  the 
Greek   geographers   speaks    of   a   stream   in   which   large 

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TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 

nuggets  of  gold  were  found.  Some  people  think  Ophir 
was  in  Arabia.  However  that  may  be,  the  traveller  Burton 
explored  the  northwestern  part  of  the  peninsula  and  found 
old  mines  and  even  traces  of  gold  dust.  If  Job  lived  in  the 
land  of  Midian  we  can  well  understand  how  he  could  de- 
scribe mining  operations  so  well  as  he  does  in  the  twenty- 
eighth  chapter  of  his  book. 

Frankincense  and  myrrh  were  also  carried  across  Arabia 
by  the  caravans,  and  both  of  these  precious  gums  came 
from  Arabia  itself  and  are  still  found  there.  One  of  the 
oldest  articles  of  commerce  was  incense.     The  gum  was 


BRANCH  OF  INCENSE  TREE. 

used  in  sacrifices  and  in  all  the  heathen  temple  worship  as 
well  as  by  the  Jews  in  their  worship.  One  thousand  talents' 
weight  of  frankincense  was  brought  every  year  to  Darius, 
the  Persian  king,  as  tribute  from  Arabia.  The  present 
incense  country  is  southern  Arabia,  especially  Hadramaut. 

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Here  the  incense  tree  (of  which  you  see  a  small  branch  in 
the  picture)  grows.  The  young  trees  are  cut  with  a  knife, 
and  from  the  incisions  made  in  the  bark  a  milk-like  juice 
comes  out.  When  it  has  had  time  to  harden,  the  large 
clear  globules  are  scraped  off  into  baskets  and  the  inferior 
kind  that  has  run  down  the  bark  is  collected  separately. 
It  is  shipped  from  Arabia  to  Bombay  or  goes  out  from 
Aden  and  still  commands  a  good  price.  In  some  Roman 
Catholic  churches  this  incense  is  burnt  every  Sunday  and 
if  you  will  go  to  a  large  druggist  he  may  be  able  to  show 
you  pieces  of  Arabian  incense. 

Myrrh  and  frankincense  are  frequently  mentioned  to- 
gether. Both  are  sweet-smelling  gums  and  both  came 
originally  from  Arabia.  According  to  a  Greek  legend, 
Myrrha  was  the  daughter  of  one  of  the  kings  of  Cyprus 
who  angered  her  father  and  when  he  attempted  to  stab  her, 
fled  to  Arabia.  Here  she  was  changed  into  a  tree  called 
myrrh!  A  few  of  these  trees  are  still  found  in  Yemen,  but 
myrrh  is  not  at  all  as  plentiful  as  it  once  was  in  Arabia.  It 
is  a  low,  thorny,  ragged-looking  tree  with  bright  green 
leaves.  The  gum  exudes  from  cracks  in  the  bark  near  the 
root  of  the  plant.  When  dry  it  is  of  a  rich  brown  colour 
and  has  a  bitter  taste.  The  word  "myrrh"  in  Arabic 
means  bitter,  and  I  think  that  is  the  origin  of  the  name 
given  to  the  tree  and  not  the  foolish  story  of  the  Greek 
mythology.  You  must  look  up  all  the  references  in  the 
Bible  to  myrrh.  I  wonder  whether  the  myrrh  which  Nico- 
demus  used  to  embalm  the  body  of  our  Saviour  for  His 
burial  came  from  Arabia  ?     In  Matthew's  gospel  we  read  of 

99 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

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the  wise  men  who  came  from  the  East  to  worship  Jesus. 
"  And  when  they  had  opened  their  treasures  they  presented 
unto  Him  gifts;  gold  and  frankincense  and  myrrh."  Do 
you  not  think  that  these  wise  men  came  from  Arabia,  even 
as  the  queen  of  Sheba  did,  to  see  the  king  of  the  Jews? 
Perhaps  Isaiah  prophesied  of  their  coming  when  he  wrote 
concerning  Arabia:  "The  multitude  of  camels  shall  cover 
thee  the  dromedaries  of  Midian  and  Ephah;  all  they  from 
Sheba  shall  come:  they  shall  bring  gold  and  incense;  and 
they  shall  shew  forth  the  praises  of  the  Lord."  At  any  rate 
we  are  quite  sure  that  the  frankincense  they  brought  came 
from  Arabia.  There  is  a  great  deal  in  the  Bible  about  this 
country  and  there  are  many  beautiful  promises  for  the  re- 
demption of  its  people.  Arabs  were  present  at  Pentecost 
and  the  first  missionary  to  Arabia  was  the  Apostle  Paul. 
God  has  not  forgotten  His  promises  and  we  must  all  pray 
that  soon  they  may  be  fulfilled.  No  one  has  yet  been  to 
tell  the  children  of  Hadramaut,  who  gather  the  incense- 
gum,  the  story  of  Jesus'  birth  and  of  His  death  on  the  cross. 
There  is  not  a  single  missionary  in  all  that  country;  no  one 
has  been  to  tell  the  news  that  the  Babe  of  Bethlehem  is  the 
King  of  Glory. 

"Thou  who  in  a  manger 

Once  hast  lowly  lain, 
Who  dost  now  in  glory 

O'er  all  kingdoms  reign, 
Gather  in  the  heathen 

Who  in  lands  afar 
Ne'er  have  see  the  brightness 

Of  Thy  guiding  star." 

100 


XVII 

SLAVES  AND  SLAVE  TRADERS 

The  Arabs  who  in  past  ages  were  the  merchants  of  the 
Orient  in  gold,  frankincense  and  myrrh,  both  then  and  now 
traded  in  slaves  also.  And  the  cruel  trade  is  not  yet  ended. 
Would  you  like  to  hear  about  some  boys  who  have  darker 
skins  than  yours,  and  darker  hearts,  because  they  do  not 
know  the  Lord  Jesus  as  their  own  Saviour?  Well,  these 
poor  little  boys  were  stolen  from  their  mothers  and  fathers 
by  wicked  men  called  Arabs,  who  go  from  Arabia  to  Africa 
in  boats  to  steal  boys  and  girls  and  bring  them  here  to  sell 
them.  Each  boy  is  sold  for  nearly  ten  pounds  ($50).  These 
men  know  it  is  wrong  in  their  hearts,  but  you  see  what  a 
lot  of  money  they  make!  What  does  St  Paul  say  ?  " The 
love  of  money  is  the  root  of  all  evil."  And  then  the  religion 
of  the  Arab  permits  him  to  do  this  work  of  stealing  and 
selling  boys  and  girls. 

One  night  about  two  or  three  years  ago,  just  as  the  sun 
was  setting,  some  little  black  boys  were  playing  and  fishing 
near  the  water  on  the  coast  of  Zanzibar,  in  East  Africa;  a 
man  came  up  to  them  and  offered  them  some  dates.  Little 
black  and  white  boys  are  always  ready  to  eat,  are  they  not  ? 
These  boys  took  the  dates  and  while  they  were  eating,  the 
man  threw  a  cloth  over  their  heads  and  carried  them  off  to  a 
boat  standing  near.  The  Arabs  caught  a  great  many  in  this 
way,  and  when  the  boat  had  as  many  as  it  could  carry  they 

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TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 

moved  away  and  began  to  travel  towards  Arabia.  The 
poor  children  were  kept  in  the  bottom  of  the  boat,  all 
huddled  together,  and  given  very  little  to  eat  and  drink. 

Sometimes  the  sea 
was  rough  and 
they  were  sick,  so 
altogether  their 
voyage  in  an  open 
boat  was  not  a 
pleasant  one.  But 
''Some One"  was 
taking  notice  of 
these  children  and 
He  was  going  to 
deliver  them.  Do 
you  know  who 
was  watching 
over  them  ?  After 
many  days  at  sea 
the  boat  came 
near  Muscat.  A 
servant  of  the 
British  Consul 
saw  the  boat  and 
knew  there  were 
slaves  in  it.  Then 
the  Consul  got  ready  in  a  small  boat  and  went  after  the  big 
one,  They  had  to  follow  nearly  all  night  and  at  last  over- 
took the  slave-dhow.     The  Consul  pulled  alongside  in  a 

102 


SLAVE  GIRL  IN  ARABIA. 


PICTURED   FOR  CHILDREN 

ARABIA 

Bedden  (native  boat)  and  demanded  the  firearms  of  the 
Arabs.  Then  he  bound  them  and  put  his  own  sailors  on 
board,  and  brought  the  precious  cargo  of  souls  into  Muscat 

harbour. 

The  owner  of  the  slave-dhow  was  sent  to  prison,  and  the 
boys  and  girls  were  given  away  to  Christian  people  to  train, 
the  missionary  in  Muscat  getting  the  largest  share. 

This  was  the  origin  of  the  rescued-slave  school  at  Muscat. 
Other  slaves  are  caught  from  time  to  time  and  liberated. 
Sometimes  they  are  sent  to  Bombay  or  other  places  in 
India;  a  large  number  were  once  liberated  at  Aden  and  are 
now  in  a  school  at  Lovedale  in  Africa.  When  these  poor 
slave  children  first  come  from  the  slave  ships  they  are  very 
ignorant  and  almost  like  wild  animals.  They  need  to  learn 
everything,  and  even  their  language  is  of  little  use  to  them, 
as  they  need  to  learn  Arabic  before  they  can  get  along  in 
Arabia.  The  Muscat  boys  first  learned  English  from  the 
missionary,  but  it  was  not  easy  for  them. 

They  only  knew  a  few  words  when  I  first  went  to  Mus- 
cat. For  instance,  they  called  all  lights,  such  as  lamps, 
candles,  etc.,  fire.  Well,  one  night  we  were  sitting  on  the 
verandah  with  the  lamp,  reading,  and  Suliman  came  and 
said  "big  fire!"  We  jumped  up  and  said  "  where?" 
Looking  all  around  we  could  not  see  a  sign  of  fire.  Then 
he  said,  "big  fire  on  table."  We  ran  into  the  dining-room 
—still  no  fire.  Suliman  then  pointed  to  the  lamp  and  said 
again  "big  fire";  so  we  learned  by  that  time  he  wanted  the 
lamp  for  the  table,  as  dinner  was  ready. 
Would  you  like  to  hear  how  a  day  was  spent  in  this  Mus- 


103 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 

cat  school  when  the  boys  were  beginning  to  learn  ?    Now 
the  boys  are  all  big  and  have  scattered;  they  are  working  as 


LIBERATED  SLAVES  AT  BAHREIN. 


servants  in  different  places  and  some  are  learning  a  trade. 
But  here  is  a  description  of  the  early  days  of  their  training: 
"  We  are  up  before  dawn  almost,  and  yet  the  boys  are  up 

104 


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ARABIA 

before  us,  and  have  taken  in  their  mats  (beds),  and  are 
splashing  about  in  the  big  cement  bath  in  the  yard.     They 
do  not  use  towels;  the  sun  soon  dries  the  skin,  and  then 
they  dress  with  one  article  only,  a  wa^eera,  a  piece  of  cloth. 
After  the  bath  they  clean   up  the  schoolroom,  sweep  the 
yard;   then    they    eat   bread   and   dates   and   drink   water. 
When  the  meal  is  finished  all  the  boys  wash  their  hands  and 
put  on  their  coats  to  come  up-stairs.     See  how  nicely  they 
march  forward,  two  and  two,  just  like  the  animals  going 
into  Noah's  Ark.     They  halt  in  front  of  the  harmonium 
'single    file'— 'face    about— 'toes    to    line!'     Now    we 
are  ready  for  prayers.     Look,  boys  and  girls,  how  quietly 
these  black  boys  stand;  now  we  are  going  to  sing:    'Jesus 
loves  me,  this   I   know.'     They  love  the  singing,  and  all 
make  as  much  noise  as  possible.     Singing  finished,  we  read 
a  short  passage  of  Scripture,  and  tell  very  simply  how  Jesus 
loved   them   and   died  for  them.     They  are  beginning  to 
learn  about  God  and  who  the  Lord  Jesus  is.     One  morning 
I  held  up  the  Bible  and  asked  them,  '  What  is  this  ? ' 
"  They  answered,  '  God's  Book.' 
11 '  And  what  do  we  read  about  in  God's  Book  ? ' 
"They  all  answered,  ' The  Lord  is  my  shepherd  I  shall  not 
want.'     I  had  been  teaching  them  this  Psalm,  but  I  did  not 
know  how  well  they  knew  it;  it  was  a  nice  answer,  do  not 
you  think  so  ?    After  the  scripture  lesson  we  kneel  and 
pray,  all  the  boys  repeating,  'O  God,  wash  me  from  all  my 
sins  in  the  blood  of  my  Saviour,  and  I  shall  be  whiter  than 
snow;  give  me  Thy  Holy  Spirit,  for  Jesus' sake.     Amen.' 
Will  you  ask  God  to  make  the  boys  pray  this  prayer  from 

105 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 

their  hearts  ?  You  see  they  are  only  just  beginning  to  learn 
about  God.  Before  they  came  to  us  they  were  quite 
heathen.  Prayer  ended  we  all  march  into  another  room,— 
you  may  come  too,  and  begin  lessons.  The  big  boys  are 
learning  sentences  now;  the  little  ones  are  still  at  A,  B,  C,  i, 
2,  3.  At  the  end  of  two  hours  of  spelling,  reading  and 
writing,  a  little  simple  drill  and  the  morning  school  is  ended. 
Some  of  the  boys  help  prepare  their  fish  and  rice  for  dinner, 
and  others  make  baskets.  At  three  o'clock  all  march  up 
again  for  sewing.  And  let  me  tell  you  a  secret;  the  smallest 
boy  of  all  sews  the  neatest.  After  this  the  boys  get  ready 
to  go  for  a  bath  in  the  sea,  or  for  a  walk.  When  we 
return  we  have  evening  prayers,  and  then  the  boys  eat  their 
supper  of  rice  and  fish,  take  their  mats  into  the  garden  and 
go  to  sleep." 

That  was  the  way  in  which  eighteen  rescued  slave  boys 
began  to  live  a  life  with  more  light,  and  therefore  also  more 
responsibility  than  their  former  life  as  savage  children  in 
Africa. 

But  what  of  the  thousands  who  are  not  rescued,  but  are 
taken  to  places  along  the  coast  of  Arabia  and  sold  ?  Their 
lot  is  miserable.  In  Mecca  there  is  a  slave  market  where 
boys  and  girls  are  sold  to  the  highest  bidder.  At  Sur,  in 
South  Arabia,  there  are  still  many  Arabs  who  make  money 
by  buying  and  selling  poor  negro  children.  Only  last  month 
a  little  negro  lad  called  "Diamond"  told  me  how  he  had 
been  captured  and  sold  to  a  merchant  in  Persia.  I  am  very 
glad  that  I  can  tell  you  that  the  little  lad  escaped  to  a  British 
ship  and  is  now  free. 

106 


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ARABIA 

A  writer  who  travelled  in  the  Red  Sea  says  that  he  passed 
hundreds  of  slave-dhows.  What  a  lot  of  misery  that  means ; 
not  only  misery  to  the  parents  of  these  stolen  children  in 
Africa,  but  to  the  children  themselves.  There  may  be  many 
slaves  in  Arabia  who  get  enough  to  eat  and  have  good 
clothing  to  wear,  but  they  always  remain  slaves  at  the  best, 
and  are  taught  a  false  religion  by  their  masters.  I  think 
nearly  all  of  them  were  happier  at  home  in  Africa  than  in 
dark  Arabia. 

It  is  hard  to  love  the  cruel  slave  trader,  is  it  not  ?  Yet 
Jesus  told  us  to  "  love  our  enemies."  The  way  to  root  out 
the  slave  trade  is  to  evangelise  the  slave  trader.  The  entire 
west  coast  of  Arabia  has  not  a  single  missionary;  no  wonder 
that  here  the  slave  trade  is  carried  on  without  hindrance! 
Will  you  not  pray  for  western  Arabia,  and  also  for  the  Arab 
slave  dealers  that  God  may  soften  their  hearts  and  make 
them  stop  their  bad  work  ?  And  will  not  all  the  girls  pray 
for  their  enslaved  black  sisters  in  Arabia,  whose  lot  is  very 
miserable  ? 


107 


XVIII 

ABOUT  SOME  LITTLE  MISSIONARIES 

Some  little  missionaries  came  to  Arabia  a  few  years  before 
any  of  the  American  missionaries  did,  and  have  been  coming 
ever  since.  Most  of  them  were  born  in  a  country  not  far 
from  Arabia,  and  yet  only  one  of  them  visited  Arabia  before 
Mohammed  was  born.  Although  they  never  write  reports 
of  their  work  in  the  papers,  yet  I  have  seen  a  few  splendid 
little  accounts  of  their  work  written  on  tablets  of  flesh  with 
tears  for  ink.  It  is  just  because  their  work  is  done  so  much 
in  secret  and  in  out-of-the-way  places,  that  they  are  gener- 
ally overlooked  and  often  underestimated.  They  receive 
only  bare  support  and  no  salary,  and  get  along  in  the  most 
self-denying  way  by  fasting  and  living  all  together,  packed 
like  herring  in  a  dark,  close  room,  except  when  they  go  out 
into  the  sunshine  on  their  journeys. 

Most  of  them  came  out  in  the  steerage  of  the  big  ships 
from  London,  but  none  of  them  were  seasick  at  all  through- 
out the  entire  voyage.  They  do  not  go  about  two  and  two 
unless  it  is  that  one  of  the  old  ones  goes  hand  in  hand  with 
a  younger  brother  for  support.  Generally  a  score  or  more 
travel  together.  They  never  complain  of  being  tired  or  dis- 
couraged, and  never  get  fever  or  cholera,  although  I  have 
talked  and  slept  with  them  at  Bahrein  when  I  had  fever  my- 
self. Never  yet  has  one  of  them  died  on  a  sick-bed,  al- 
though they  often  hide  away  and  disappear  for  months. 

108 


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ARABIA 

On  one  or  two  occasions  I  have  heard  of  a  small  company 
of  them  being  burned  at  the  stake,  but  1  was  told  that  not  a 
groan  escaped  from  their  lips,  nor  were  their  companions 
frightened  the  least  bit.  With  my  own  eyes  I  have  seen 
one  or  two  of  them  torn  asunder  and  trampled  upon  by 
those  who  hate  Jesus  Christ  and  His  kingdom  and  His  little 
missionaries.  Yet  the  only  sound  to  be  heard  was  the 
blasphemies  of  their  persecutors,  who  could  not  answer 
them  in  any  other  way. 

It  is  very  strange  indeed,  that  when  once  one  or  two  of 
them   get   acclimatised   and   learn   the   language,   they  are 
bound  to  their  work  by  so  many  tiny  cords  of  love  that 
they  seldom  fall  apart  from  their  work  or  fall  out  one  with 
the  other.     There  are  more  than  sixty  different  names  and 
ages  among  them,  and  yet  they  all  have  one  family  accent. 
Some  of  them  are  medical  missionaries  and  can  soothe  and 
heal  even  broken  hearts  and  prevent  broken  heads.     There 
are  two   ladies  among  them,   but  they  seldom  go  about 
alone,  and,  especially  in  Arabia,  the  men  do  most  of  the 
preaching.     Most  of  them  are  evangelists  or  apostles  and 
teachers.     And  their  enterprise  and  push!  why  one  of  them 
told  me  the  other  day  that  he  wanted  "  to  preach  the  gospel 
in  the  regions  beyond"  Mecca,  and  that  even  there  "every 
knee  should  bow  to  Jesus"    Why,  you  begin  to  see  them 
everywhere  in   the  Persian  Gulf  and  around  Muscat  and 
Aden.     Last  year  a  few  of  them  went  to  Jiddah  with  the 
pilgrims.      They   dress   very   plainly,    but  often   in  bright 
Oriental  colours  (one  just  came  in  all  in  green);  on  one  or 
two  occasions  I  have  seen  them  wear  gold  when  visiting  a 

109 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 

rich  man,  but  there  was  no  pride  about  them,  and  they  put 
on  no  airs  in  their  talk. 

How  many  are  there  of  these  little  missionaries,  do  you 
ask  ?  Over  three  thousand  eight  hundred  and  forty  visited 
and  left  the  three  stations  of  the  Arabian  Mission  in  the 
Persian  Gulf  last  year.  But,  as  I  told  you,  they  are  so 
modest  that  only  a  score  of  them  perhaps  sent  in  any 


MISSION  HOUSE  AT  BUSRAH. 


account  of  their  work,  and  that  even  was  sent  through  a 

third  party  by  word  of  mouth.     I  have  heard  it  whispered 

that  a  faithful  record  of  all  their  journeys  and  speeches  is 

kept,  but  that  these  are  put  on  file  to  be  published  all  at 

once  on  a  certain  great  day,  when  missionaries  all  get  their 

permanent  discharge.     What  a  quiet,  patient,  faithful,  loving 

body  of  workers  they  are.     Even  when  it  is  very,  very  hot, 

and  after  a  hard  day's  work,  they  never  get  out  of  temper 

as  other  missionaries  sometimes  do  when  in  hot  discussion 

no 


PICTURED   FOR  CHILDREN 

ARABIA 

with  a  bigoted  Moslem.  And  yet  how  plainly  they  tell  the 
truth — they  do  not  even  fear  a  Turkish  Pasha;  but  that  is 
because  they  have  very  cunningly  all  obtained  a  Turkish 
passport  and  a  permit  to  preach  anywhere  unmolested. 

Of  course,  you  have  guessed  my  riddle,  or  else  you  will 
want  to  know  what  these  missionaries  cost  and  why  we  do 
not  employ  more  of  them;  and  who  sent  them  out,  and  to 
what  Board  they  are  responsible;  and  who  buys  them  new 
clothes  of  leather  and  cloth;  and  what  happens  to  them 
when  their  backs  are  bent  with  age  and  their  faces  furrowed 
with  care,  and  when  only  they  themselves  can  read  their 
title  clear  ? 

I  think  no  one  will  have  to  help  you  guess  my  riddle  or 
tell  you  that  the  four  missionaries  who  go  about  the  most 
are  Matthew,  Mark,  Luke  and  John,  and  that  the  two  ladies 
are  Esther  and  Ruth.  Now  you  have  guessed  that  the 
Little  Missionaries  are  the  Books  of  the  Bible.  Do  you 
know  how  many  there  are  ?  How  many  in  the  Old  Testa- 
ment ?  How  many  in  the  New  Testament  ?  Perhaps  some 
of  you  know  the  names  of  all  the  sixty-six!  But  it  is  not 
enough  to  know  the  names  of  these  Books  that  we  have 
called  Little  Missionaries.  We  must  know  what  is  in  them, 
we  must  know  the  message  they  bear  to  this  sinful  and 
troubled  world.  And  we  must  all  do  our  part  to  send  out 
this  blessed  message  of  peace,  comfort,  and  eternal  life.  It 
may  not  be  your  work  to  go  to  Arabia,  but  yet  you  have  a 
work  to  do  of  one  kind  or  another  for  Arabia.  The  Bible 
must  be  sent  there.     And  now  may  I  ask  all  the  boys  and 

girls   who  read  this  to  pray  for  the   Little   Missionaries? 

ill 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 
Pray  that  they  may  go  ahead  and  prepare  the  way  of  the 
Lord  all  over  this  dark  peninsula,  from  the  palm  groves 
of  Busrah  to  the  harbour  of  Aden,  and  from  the  sea  of  Oman 
to  the  unholy  cities,— Mecca  and  Medina. 

"Jesus,  tender  Shepherd 

Thou  hast  other  sheep 
Far  away  from  shelter 

Where  dark  shadows  creep. 
Seeking  Saviour,  bring  them  home 
That  they  may  no  longer  roam. 

"Jesus,  tender  Shepherd 

While  Thou  leadest  me, 
As  Thy  little  helper 

Faithful  may  I  be. 
Seeking  others  far  and  wide 
Drawing  lost  ones  to  Thy  side." 


112 


XIX 
TURNING  THE  WORLD  UPSIDE  DOWN 

About  eighteen  hundred  and  fifty  years  ago  two  mission- 
aries came  to  a  town  in  Asia  Minor,  called  Thessalonica, 
and  began  to  preach.  They  did  nobody  any  harm  and 
only  talked  about  the  love  of  Jesus  Christ  for  sinners.  A 
great  number  of  people  believed  and  attended  their  meet- 
ings. Some  of  the  noble  and  wealthy  women  of  the  town 
also  became  Christians  and  for  about  three  weeks  the 
preaching  went  on  unhindered.  However,  as  soon  as  the 
enemies  of  the  gospel  saw  that  Paul  and  Silas  were  meeting 
with  success  they  did  their  best  to  stir  up  trouble.  A  mob 
collected  and  with  a  great  deal  of  noise  and  shouting  pulled 
some  of  the  new  believers  through  the  streets,  crying: 
"  They  that  have  turned  the  world  upside  down  are  come 
hither  also!  "  Just  as  it  was  in  Thessalonica  so  it  has  been 
in  every  place  where  the  gospel  has  been  preached.  The 
word  of  God  does  turn  the  world  upside  down.  The 
gospel  is  powerful  and  its  effect  is  often  at  first  to  stir  up 
the  envy  and  hatred  of  men  who  love  not  God.  When  the 
heathen  are  worshipping  idols  and  enjoying  sinful  pleasures 
they  like  to  be  let  alone.  A  thief  does  not  like  the  police- 
man's lantern.  Those  who  do  dark  things  hate  the  light. 
The  Moslem's  idea  of  right  and  wrong  is  so  crooked  that 
he  does  not  like  to  have  it  exposed. 

Supposing  there  was  a  country  where  all  the  people  wore 

113 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 


THE  SULTAN'S  SOLDIERS. 


PICTURED   FOR  CHILDREN 

ARABIA 

their  garments  wrong  side  out  because  they  knew  no  better, 
and  then  some  one  came  wearing  his  clothes  properly  and 
trying  to  teach  these  ignorant  people,  would  they  not  think 
him  mad  and  say  why  do  you  not  turn  your  coat  inside  out  ? 

That  is  the  very  way  Moslems  regard  the  missionary. 
They  often  tell  us,  "You  are  so  good  and  kind  why 
don't  you  accept  the  true  religion  and  become  a  be- 
liever?" You  must  not  think  that  the  heathen  or  the 
Mohammedans  are  anxious  to  hear  the  gospel.  They  do 
not  know  of  its  value  and  so  do  not  know  what  they 
miss.  When  they  hear  that  the  gospel  demands  a  holy  life 
and  forbids  all  swearing  and  lying  and  uncleanness,  they 
think  such  a  religion  too  difficult  and  prefer  their  own. 
All  their  topsy-turvy  ways  and  thoughts  seem  perfectly 
correct  to  themselves  until  God's  Spirit  enlightens  them. 

It  is  no  wonder  therefore  that  there  is  always  opposition 
and  trouble  when  missionaries  (even  such  quiet  little 
missionaries  as  we  read  about),  come  to  a  village.  When 
you  want  to  put  a  thing  straight  that  is  upside  down  there 
is  sure  to  be  an  overturning.  The  farmer  is  not  sorry 
because  his  rude  plow  breaks  the  hard  soil  and  bruises  the 
weeds  and  turns  all  the  greensward  under.  Oh  no;  he 
does  that  to  make  some  better  green  grow.  Wait  three 
months  and  you  will  see  the  whole  field  covered  with  a 
waving  harvest  of  wheat.  Ploughing  is  pretty  rough  work 
on  weeds.  Opening  a  new  mission  station  is  pretty  rough, 
I  admit,  on  a  false  religion.  And  the  wise  men  cannot  help 
knowing  this  and  so  they  repeat  the  words  of  the  old 
Greeks  when   they  see  a  missionary  settle  down  in  their 


115 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 

village:  "Those  that  have  turned  the  world  upside  down 
are  come  hither  also  .  .  .  saying  that  there  is  another 
King,  Jesus." 

The  king  of  all  hearts  in  the  Mohammedan  world  is  their 
prophet  Mohammed.  They  love  his  name  and  imitate 
his  acts  to  the  least  particular.  Much  more  faithfully,  I 
fear,  than  we  imitate  Jesus,  our  example.  The  great  ques- 
tion in  Arabia  is  whether  Mohammed  or  Jesus  is  to  rule  the 
country.  Mohammed  has  had  it  very  much  his  own  way 
for  thirteen  hundred  years,  but  now  his  dominion  is  being 
disputed.  God's  providence  is  working  in  many  ways  to 
help  His  gospel.  I  sometimes  think  that  we  might  call  His 
providence  the  plow  and  His  gospel  the  good  seed.  For 
example,  what  a  strange  thing  it  is  for  the  Arabs  to  find 
Christian  governments  interfering  with  their  slave  trade. 
Does  not  the  Koran  approve  of  slave  holders  and  did  not 
Mohammed  buy  and  sell  slaves  ?  And  then  when  the  big 
merchant  ships  come  to  the  coasts  of  Arabia  and  the 
ignorant  Arabs  learn  of  other  lands  and  peoples  and  civili- 
sation they  cannot  help  losing  some  of  their  pride  and 
prejudice.  They  compare  the  government  of  England  in 
Aden  with  that  of  the  Turks  in  Sanaa  and  then — well 
they  feel  like  turning  the  world  upside  down  themselves! 

The  Mohammedan  religion  has  such  a  strong  hold  in 
Arabia  that  it  will  not  be  overcome  in  one  day  or  by  one 
battle.  We  must  expect  a  long  and  hard  fight.  Before 
Topsy-turvy  Land  becomes  a  Christian  land  there  will  be 
martyrs  in  Arabia.  Every  Moslem  who  accepts  Christ  does 
so  at  his  peril,  and  yet  there  are  those  who  dare  to  confess 

116 


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ARABIA 

Christ  before  men.  When  you  read  in  mission  reports  of 
troubles  and  opposition,  of  burning  up  books,  imprisoning 
colporteurs  and  expelling  missionaries  you  must  not  think 
that  the  gospel  is  being  defeated.  It  is  conquering.  What 
we  see  under  such  circumstances  is  only  the  dust  in  the 
wake  of  the  ploughman.  God  is  turning  the  world  upside 
down  that  it  may  be  right  side  up  when  Jesus  comes.  He 
that  plougheth  should  plough  in  hope.  We  may  not  be 
able  to  see  a  harvest  yet  in  this  country  but,  furrow  after 
furrow,  the  soil  is  getting  ready  for  the  seed. 

Don't  some  of  you  want  to  come  and  do  a  day's  plough- 
ing for  the  King?  There  are  some  splendid  stretches  of 
virgin  prairie  yet  untouched  between  Bahrein  and  Mecca. 


117 


/ 


XX 

TURNING  THE  WORLD  DOWNSIDE  UP 

The  story  of  mission  work  in  Arabia  is  not  very  long,  but 
it  is  full  of  interest.  From  the  day  when  Mohammed  pro- 
claimed himself  an  apostle  in  Mecca  until  about  sixteen 
years  ago  when  Ion  Keith  Falconer  came  to  Aden  as  a  mis- 
sionary, all  of  Topsy-turvy  Land  lay  in  darkness  as  regards 
the  gospel.  For  thirteen  hundred  years  Mohammed  had  it 
all  his  own  way  in  Arabia.  Now  his  dominion  over  the 
hearts  of  men,  is  in  dispute,  and  there  is  no  doubt  that  the 
final,  full  victory  will  rest  with  Jesus  the  Son  of  God,  the 
Saviour  of  the  world. 

Would  you  like  to  hear  something,  before  we  close  this 
book  about  the  missions  that  are  now  working  in  this  coun- 
try ?  There  are  three  missions.  The  missionaries  of  the 
Church  of  England  began  work  in  Bagdad  about  the  year 
1882.  Bagdad  is  not  at  all  a  small  town.  It  has  a  popula- 
tion of  one  hundred  and  eighty  thousand  people,  and  it  was 
once  a  very  important  city.  You  can  read  all  about  its 
ancient  beauty  and  wealth  and  commerce  in  the  Arabian 
Nights.  Some  of  the  palaces  that  Harouner  Rashid  visited 
are  still  standing.  In  the  city  there  are  at  present  sixty-four 
mosques,  six  churches  and  twenty-two  synagogues.  One- 
third  of  the  population  are  Jews,  and  there  are  over  five 
thousand  Christians.  Most  of  the  latter  belong  to  the  Ro- 
man Catholic  faith,  or  to  other  twilight  churches.  The  Ro- 
lls 


PICTURED    FOR    CHILDREN 

ARABIA 

man  Catholic  cathedral,  which  you  see  in  the  picture,  is  the 
only  church  in  all  Northern  Arabia  that  has  a  bell.  Moslems 
do  not  like  to  hear  church-bells,  and  they  were  forbidden 
by  some  rulers  of  the  Moslem  world  long  ago.  The  Prot- 
estant Christians  meet  for  worship  in  a  dwelling-house. 
The  Bagdad  mission  has  a  large  dispensary  for  the  sick 
where  thousands  of  Moslems  and  Jews  and  Christians  come 
every  year  for  treatment.  Books  are  sold  to  the  people,  and 
there  is  a  school  for  boys  and  girls  which  is  also  helping  to 
turn  down  old  prejudices  and  turn  up  the  right  side  of  child- 
life.  The  Moslem  children  are  beginning  to  believe  that  the 
world  is  round  and  that  Constantinople  is  not  the  capital  of 
all  Europe. 

The  British  and  Foreign  Bible  Society  is  also  helping  to 
turn  this  part  of  the  world  downside  up.  The  gospel 
which  has  been  buried  under  many  superstitions  and  tradi- 
tions so  long,  is  again  showing  its  power.  Colporteurs 
are  men  who  carry  the  Bible  about,  offer  it  to  the  people 
and  read  and  explain  it  to  those  whose  hearts  are  open. 
They  have  a  hard  task,  but  if  it  were  not  for  them  the  "  Lit- 
tle Missionaries  "  would  not  get  along  at  all. 

On  the  way  from  Bagdad  to  Busrah,  we  pass  Amara,  an 
enterprising  village  where  the  people  once  burned  books 
and  threw  stones  at  the  missionary,  but  where  now  the  little 
Bible-shop  of  the  American  Mission  shines  unhindered, 

"  Like  a  little  candle,  burning  in  the  night." 

At  Busrah,  Rev.  James  Cantine  began  mission  work  in 
1891,  and  ever  since  that  time  he  and  others   have  been 

119 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 

ploughing  and  sowing  seed  and  waiting  for  the  showers 
that  come  before  the  harvest.  It  was  at  Busrah  that  Kamil 
Abd  el  Messiah,  the  Moslem  convert  from  Syria,  died  a  wit- 
ness for  Christ.  Have  you  read  the  wonderful  story  of  his 
life  ?  It  is  full  of  pathos  and  shows  how  in  the  heart  and 
life  of  at  least  one  Moslem  the  Holy  Spirit  made  topsy-turvy 
things  straight.  There  are  others  like  Kamil  in  Arabia,  but 
many  of  them  are  still  following  the  Master  afar  off,  because 
they  fear  the  persecutions  of  men.  At  Busrah,  there  is  also 
a  dispensary,  and  here  too  the  gospel  is  sold  and  preached 
and  lived  before  the  people. 

Bahrein,  you  know,  is  a  group  of  islands,  and  it  is  about 
six  years  ago  that  the  people  first  saw  a  missionary.  Nearly 
three-fourths  of  the  population  are  pearl-merchants  or  pearl- 
fishers.  Will  you  not  pray  that  they  may  learn  to  value  the 
Pearl  of  Great  Price  ? 

A  visit  any  morning  in  the  week  to  the  dispensary  at 
Bahrein,  would  soon  convince  you  that  here  too  the  Arab 
world  is  slowly  but  surely  turning  downside  up.  Women 
learn  to  their  delight  that  they  have  equal  right  to  sympathy 
with  men,  and  they  need  not  wait  until  the  men  are  helped 
first.  The  Arabs  are  very  ignorant  of  medicine  and  their 
remedies  are  either  foolish  or  cruel.  To  "  let  out  the 
pain"  in  rheumatism,  they  burn  the  body  with  a  hot  iron. 
All  their  ideas  are  upside  down,  and  very  few  know  on 
which  side  of  their  body  the  liver  is  located.  Now  when  our 
mission  doctors  perform  miracles  of  surgery  on  the  maimed, 
and  miracles  of  mercy  on  the  suffering,  the  result  is  to  pre- 
pare their  hearts  for  Christ's  message.     To  the  fanatic  Mos- 

120 


PICTURED    FOR    CHILDREN 

ARABIA 

lem  a  Christian  is  "an  ignorant  unbeliever."     But  we  may 
put  a  parody  on  Pope's  lines  and  say,  in  their  case: 

"  A  Christian  is  a  monster  of  such  frightful  mien 
That  to  be  hated  needs  but  to  be  seen. 
But  seen  too  oft  familiar  with  his  face 
They  first  endure,  then  pity,  then  embrace." 

Many  of  the  Moslems  who  in  gratitude  are  ready  to  em- 
brace a  Christian  physician  may  yet  learn  to  embrace  Chris- 
tian teaching. 

Muscat  in  Arabic,  means  "the  place  where  something 
falls."  And  the  surroundings  are  so  rocky  and  steep  that 
everything  has  a  chance  to  tumble  down  except  the  mer- 
cury in  the  thermometer.  That  is  always  up  high.  In  this 
hot,  crowded  town,  the  Arabian  Mission  opened  its  third 
station  in  the  year  1893.  Two  years  before  the  veteran 
missionary-bishop,  Thomas  Valpy  French  laid  down  his  life 
here,  and  the  fallen  standard  was  taken  up  by  Peter  J. 
Zwemer.  After  five  years  of  toil  in  Oman,  he  also  entered 
into  rest.  George  E.  Stone,  his  successor  in  Oman,  was 
also  worthy  of  the  martyr's  crown,  and  his  simple  grave  at 
Muscat  tells  how  "he  arose,  forsook  all,  and  followed 
Christ." 

This  part  of  Arabia  is  sacred  because  of  what  these  three 
pioneers  suffered  to  open  the  door  for  the  gospel.  I  do  not 
think  the  King  will  leave  a  province  where  He  has  buried 
so  much  treasure  in  the  hands  of  the  enemy,  do  you? 
The  work  of  preaching  in  Oman  is  at  present  full  of 
promise,    and    the    people    seem    willing    to   hear.      The 

121 


PICTURED    FOR    CHILDREN 

ARABIA 

American  Bible  Society  is  sending  the  Scriptures  all  over 
Eastern  Arabia. 

The  last  mission  station  in  Arabia  we  mention,  is  the  first 
that  people  generally  visit.  Aden  is  a  coaling  station  as 
well  as  a  missionary  centre  and  passengers  travelling  to  the 
Orient  nearly  always  stop  here  on  the  way.  There  are 
Christian  churches  and  hospitals  and  government  schools. 
At  Sheikh  Ottoman,  a  short  distance  from  Aden,  Ion  Keith 
Falconer,  the  first  modern  missionary  to  this  land,  began  his 
work.  He  died  here  also,  but  his  life  was  so  full  of  love 
and  sacrifice  that  his  work  is  still  going  on.  The  Free 
Church  of  Scotland  mission  has  medical  work,  an  industrial 
school  for  waifs  and  a  memorial  chapel.  From  a  great  dis- 
tance patients  come  to  be  cured,  and  Moslems  to  buy  the 
Bible. 

The  great  lighthouse  on  the  island  of  Perim,  near  Aden, 
throws  its  light  for  ten  miles  out  on  the  dark  sea  and  saves 
ships  from  the  breakers.  But  the  light  of  the  gospel  in  the 
Bible  depot  at  Aden,  shines  two  hundred  miles  to  the  north 
as  far  as  Sanaa,  and  three  hundred  miles  east  to  Makalla  on 
the  coast.  Yet  I  dare  say  it  costs  more  to  keep  up  the  light- 
house at  Perim  (not  to  speak  of  building  it)  than  it  does  to 
keep  open  all  the  Bible  lighthouses  of  all  Arabia.  Perhaps 
Keith  Falconer  thought  of  this  when  he  said  in  his  farewell 
address: 

"  We  Christians  have  a  great  and  imposing  war  office,  but 
a  very  small  army.  While  vast  continents  are  shrouded  in 
almost  utter  darkness  and  hundreds  of  millions  suffer  the 
horrors  of  heathenism  and  Islam,  the  burden  of  proof  lies 

123 


TOPSY-TURVY      LAND 

ARABIA 

upon  you  to  show  that  the  circumstances  in  which  God  has 
placed  you,  were  meant  by  Him  to  keep  you  out  of  the  for- 
eign mission  field." 

Before  you  lay  aside  this  book,  will  you  not  ask  yourself 
why  you  should  not  go  out  to  Arabia,  or  to  some  other  land 
yet  shrouded  in  darkness,  and  shine  for  Jesus  ? 


An  Old  Friend  in  a  New  Dress. 


ARABIC. 


LITERAL  TRANSLATION. 


Seyyidi-'l-Fadi-'l  Gani,      Our  Lord,  the  rich  Saviour, 

Kalbehoo  yuhibbooni,         His  heart  loves  me, 

Fa  lahoo  kooloo  saghier.     And  to  Him  all  little  ones 

belong. 
Yaltajee  wahoo'1  kadeer.     He  protects  us  and  is  strong. 


Kad  faaka  hubban. 
Kad  faaka  hubban. 
Kad  faaka  hubban. 
Yuhibbuna  Yasooa. 


Yes  His  love  exceeds  alL 
Yes  His  love  exceeds  all. 
Yes  His  love  exceeds  alL 
Jesus  loves  you. 


-rMZ: 


M-S-g- 


124 


Will     'Delight    E-Very    Child    LcOer 


the  CHINESE  -BOyAND  GI*RL 

By 

Isaac  Taylor  Headland 

Illustrated.   4to,  $1.00  Net 


E 


'  VEN  more  interesting  and  quaint  than  Dr.  Head- 
,  land's  'Chinese  Mother  Goose'  rhymes  of  last 
year.  The  almond-eyed  boys  and  girls  have  a  great 
variety  of  games,  many  resembling  those  of  Western 
lands,  others  different  but  queer  and  funny,  and  some 
of  these  latter  our  boys  and  girls  may  like  to  learn. 
The  pictures  and  page-decoration  are  of  the  same  jolly 
and  curious  kind  found  in  the  '  Mother  Goose'  book. 
The  two  books  together  really  contain  the  results  of  a 
thorough  study  of  Chinese  child-life,  and  are  at  the 
same  time  immensely  entertaining  !  "—  The  Outlook. 
"Whoever  argues  from  the  solemnity  of  the  adult, 
'Mongolian  in  a  strange  land,'  that  the  Chinese  at 
home  must  have  a  sad  boyhood  will  be  undeceived  on 
reading  this  pleasing  book.  It  is  as  full  of  fun,  in  its 
way,  as  the  preceding  '  Chinese  Mother  Goose  Rhymes  ' 
of  the  same  observing  and  careful  scholar.  For  chil- 
dren of  any  growth  this  book  will  afford  endless 
amusement  and  reveal  a  new  and  unsuspected  China. 
It  makes  two  worlds  kin."—  New  York  Evening  Post. 

CHINESE  MOTHE'R  GOOSE 

Translated  and  Illustrated  by 

Isaac     T5aylor    Headland 

Small  quarto,  Boards,  Fully  Illustrated,  160  Pages,  $1.25 

"We  have  rarely  seen  a  more  charming  book  for 
children  than  this.  Certainly  it  is  in  the  fullest  sense 
unique.  Here  he  has  translated  many  rhymes  common 
in  the  Chinese  nursery,  and  each  page  presents  one  of 
these  rhymes,  both  in  the  Chinese  characters  and  in 
an  English  translation  into  verse,  while  each  is  accom- 
panied by  a  little  picture  of  Chinese  life  directly  repro- 
duced from  a  photograph.  In  every  respect  the  book 
is  at  the  same  time  thoroughly  Chinese  and  yet  attract- 
ive to  the  eyes  of  American  children." — The  Outlook. 


"They    MaK.e     Two     Worlds     Kin" 


By    AMY     LE    FEUVRE 
BUNNY'S     FRIENDS 

i2mo,  decorated  boards,  30c. 

"  Bunny  is  a  little  girl,  and  her  friends  are  a  rabbit,  a  pony 
and  a  lark.  Each  one  narrates  his  experiences  to  the  child  as  she 
is  alone  with  him  in  the  open  room.  Children  will  listen  eagerly  to 
the  reading  of  these  little  tales,  and  will  doubtless  be  profited  by 
them." — N.   Y.  Observer. 

"  'Bunny'  herself  was  not  a  rabbit,  as  one  might  suspect.  She 
was  a  little  lonely  girl,  and  her  name  was  Dora.  She  had  a  little, 
dark,  silky  head,  and  big,  blue  eyes,  which  were  always  staring  out 
at  the  world  with  big  thoughts  behind  them,  and  she  was  still  only 
when  some  one  told  her  a  story."—  IV estern  Christian  Advocate. 

JTRIC'S     GOOD     NEWS 

Illustrated,      1 2mo,  decorated  boards,  30c. 

41  Eric  Wallace  is  an  invalid  lad,  delicate,  sweet  and  winsome, 
who  by  precept  and  example  leads  erring  and  scoffing  men  to  faith 
in  Christ.  The  good  work  is  done  in  a  natural  and  perfectly  childish 
way,  without  any  painful  exhibitions  of  precocity  or  goodishness. 
The  story  is  simply  a  glimpse  here  and  there  into  the  life  of  a  pure 
hearted,  sweet  natured,  happy  soul  who  leads  others  into  the  light 
because  he  is  in  the  light  himself.  It  is  a  tender  and  beautiful  story 
of  Christian  influence,  conduct  and  example."— Christian   Work. 

WHAT    THE    WIND    DID 

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"  Miss  Le  Feuvre's  stories  about  child  life  are  charmingly 
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"  Her  stories  are  as  bright  and  interesting  and  touching  as  if 
Juliana  ^wing  or  I  aura  Richards  had  written  them." — Evangelist. 

"A  clever  tale,  written  with  a  high  purpose.  ...  A  suc- 
cessful endeavor  of  one  whose  pen  has  found  its  highest  employ- 
ment in  the  realistic  sketching  of  child  life."— Christian  Advocate. 

gULBS    AND    BLOSSOMS 

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"  Many  sweet  lessons  of  faith  and  love  drop  from  the  lips  of 
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one  of  the  aunts  is  impressively  brought  out.  The  book  is  daintily 
bound,  and   pretty   illustrations  brighten  it" — Louisville  Observer. 

"  An  engaging  Easter  story  in  relation  to  two  children  who 
are  sent  from  India  to  their  aunt  in  England  to  acquire  strength 
and  vigor  from  a  cool  climate  and  other  benefits  from  association 
with  English   people." — Christian  Intelligencer, 


By    AMY     LE    FEUVRE 


PROBABLE  SONS  Vioth  thousand. 
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11  We  do  not  know  the  author  of  this  very  touching  tale.  It  is 
equal  to  '  Fishin'  Jimmy  '  in  its  way,  while  as  an  illustration  of  the 
text,  'A  little  child  shall  lejd  them,'  it  is  the  most  irresistibly  pa- 
thetic tale  we  remember  to  have  seen.  Among  the  brightest,  most 
charming  and  irresistible  of  child-creations  in  our  recent  literature." 
—  The  Independence.'"  ,,,,,.,,      , 

"One  of  the  brightest,  sweetest,  most  helpful  little  books 
for  young  and  old  that  we  have  seen  for  many  a  day.  It  is  alive 
with  that  sort  of  humor  that  is  so  close  to  pathos  that  one  laughs 
and  cries  in  the  same  breath.  It  speaks  to  the  very  heart,  and 
appeals  strongly  to  all  'probable  sons.'  in  whatever  station  or  con- 
dition, in  an  irresistible  way;  and  with  winning  simplicity  and 
confidence  shows  the  readiness  of  the  Father  to  forgive  and  to 
receive." — Christian  Work. 

f  EDDY'S    BUTTON 

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"A  captivating  story.  Teddy  and  Nancy  win  our  hearts. 
Tedd'ys  brave  fight  with  himself  commands  admiration,  and  stout- 
hearted, handsome  Nancy,  a  real  girl  in  all  her  doings,  conquers 
the  heart.  A  very  good  story  is  this  for  the  children."—  The 
Christian  Intelligencer.  ......  , 

"'Teddy's  Button'  was  taken  from  the  coat  of  his  dying  sol- 
dier father,  and  in  the  hands  of  the  boy  became  a  sort  of  talisman 
and  an  incentive  to  valiant  service  as  a  soldier  of  Jesus  Christ. 
The  story  is  one  of  fascinating  interest,  and  the  moral  of  it  is  not 
far  to  seek.  The  little  folks  will  need  no  urging  to  read  it."—  The 
Evangelist. 

J±    THOUGHTLESS  SEVEN 

Profusely  illustrated.      Small  4to,  decorated 
cloth,  50c. 

"  Thunder,"  "Li"  (Lightning),  "Taters,"  "  Honey,"  "Pat," 
"Pixie,"  and  "Doodle-doo,"  make  up  the  rollicking  group  whose 
adventures  and  chatter  are  here  recorded.  They  are  mercurial 
and  insurrectionary  to  the  last  degree,  and  fly  in  a  perpetual  "merry- 
go-round."  But  a  strain  of  seriousness  ea^ly  begins  to  develop, 
leading  up  into  large  and  noble  Christian  exper  ence  and  ambition. 
The  incarnation  of  religion  in  daily  life  where  it  is  "  not  too  good  for 
human  nature's  daily  food,"  is  admirably  exemplified  and  com- 
mended."—  Watchman. 

"A  big  and  a  bright  and  interesting  family  is  here  set  before 
us.     How  one  of  them  began  to  think,  and  then  by  acting  on  her 
thinking  led  the  others  into  the  right  way  ihe  little  sketch  tells. 
—Pilgrim  Teacher. 


By    AMY    LE    FEUVRE 

QN    THE    EDGE   OF    THE 
MOOR 

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"A  delightful  story  of  a  quiet  country  life,  of  one  who  was 
eager  to  do  good  to  her  fellow-beings,  and  who  improved  every  op- 
portunity to  do  so.  Especially  may  those  whose  home  is  in  the 
quiet  country, and  who  think  that  there  ?s  no  opportunities  for  doing 
good  to  be  found  there,  find  hints  of  ways  in  which  much  good  may 
be  done.  The  lives  into  which  the  least  sunshine  comes— these 
are  the  ones  which  need  our  help  the  most." — Christian  Herald. 

"  This  is  another  of  those  charming  and  healthy  stories  for 
young  people  for  which  this  author  has  become  distinguished.  It 
is  a  good  book  for  the  home  or  the  Sunday-school  library."— Zion's 
Herald. 


DWELL    DEEP 

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"  A  story  of  a  girl  who,  being  left  without  a  home,  went  to  live 
with  her  guardian,  who  had  a  number  of  children.  Hilda  Thorn 
was  trying  to  be  a  Christian,  and  her  associates  were  very  worldly, 
which  made  it  hard  for  her.  It  is  an  interesting  story,  with 
the  reality  of  experience." — The  Religious  Herald. 

"An  intensely  interesting  story.  The  author  plainly  illustrates 
the  possibility  of  magnifying  Christian  life  and  character  amid  the 
whirl  of  gayety  and  pleasure  in  social  life.  Character  speaks  with 
effectiveness,  and  the  world  bows  in  acknowledgment  to  practical 
Christianity  in  a  positive  religious  character.  The  author  evidently 
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JJIS    BIG   OPPORTUNITY 

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"Aside  from  its  lively  interest,  this  story  will  be  good  for  boys 
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right,  and  it  leaves  a  smack  of  hearty  encouragement  in  the  youth- 
ful mind." — The  Independent. 

"  Here  is  a  capital  little  story  for  boys,  for  girls,  or  for  grown 
people.  Of  course,  it  is  a  story  with  a  moral,  and  the  moral  is  al- 
ways obvious  ;  but  it  does  not  interrupt  the  story,  which  is  good." 
— Church  Standard. 

The  story  is  a  very  pretty  one,  and  nice  to  give  little  children 
or  to  put  in  a  Sunday-school  library.  The  sentiment  is  not  mawk- 
ish nor  the  religious  element  overdone. 


Date  Due 

<$) 

PRINTED 

IN  U.  S.  A. 

